Dispute over U.N. missile sanctions on Iran holds up deal: officials

[July 06, 2015]  VIENNA (Reuters) - A dispute over United Nations sanctions on Iran's ballistic missile program is among the issues holding up a nuclear deal between Tehran and six world powers as a Tuesday deadline for an accord approaches, Iranian and Western officials said.

"The Iranians want the ballistic missile sanctions lifted. They say there is no reason to connect it with the nuclear issue, a view that is difficult to accept," a Western official told Reuters. "There's no appetite for that on our part." Iranian and Western officials confirmed this view.

Separately, a senior Iranian official told reporters on condition of anonymity in the Austrian capital on Monday that Tehran wanted a United Nations arms embargo terminated as well.

(Reporting by Parisa Hafezi, Louis Charbonneau, John Irish and Arshad Mohammed)

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