MR PRICE: Good afternoon. Welcome back to the briefing room, to your briefing room. We’ll be spending quite a bit of time together starting very shortly, and I very much look forward to that. But today, first, I have the privilege of introducing for the first time to this room the 71st Secretary of State, Mr. Tony Blinken. So with no further ado, I turn it over to him.

SECRETARY BLINKEN: Thank you. Good afternoon. Let me start by saying that my first ambition is to be known as the man who brought Ned Price to the State Department briefing room. And that, at least, is mission accomplished.

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QUESTION: Hello, Mr. Secretary. Humeyra Pamuk from Reuters. I want to ask you about Iran. They said they would like United States to lift all the sanctions first, while you said they need to come back in full compliance. So how do you plan to reconcile that and when should we expect to open the negotiations, and who would led them for the United States?

And if I may, on China, you talked about reviews. And with respect to Uyghurs in Xinjiang, in your confirmation hearing you endorsed the genocide determination, but today Linda Thomas‑Greenfield said the department is reviewing that determination. Is that only about the process or are there different views on this determination? And should we expect some more punitive action throughout this. Thank you.

SECRETARY BLINKEN: So I haven’t actually seen what Ambassador Thomas‑Greenfield said, so I can’t – I can’t comment on it. But I – my judgment remains that genocide was committed against – against the Uyghurs and that – that hasn’t changed.

With regard to Iran, President Biden has been very clear in saying that if Iran comes back into full compliance with its obligations under the JCPOA, the United States would do the same thing and then we would use that as a platform to build, with our allies and partners, what we called a longer and stronger agreement and to deal with a number of other issues that are deeply problematic in the relationship with Iran.

But we are a long ways from that point. Iran is out of compliance on a number of fronts. And it would take some time, should it make the decision to do so, for it to come back into compliance in time for us then to assess whether it was meeting its obligations. So we’re not – we’re not there yet to say the least.

And then with regards to how we would engage this issue if Iran decides to come back into compliance, I can tell you that we will – we will build a strong team of experts and we will bring to bear different perspectives on the issue.

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