Iran nuclear deal parties discuss salvaging the accord

Dec 16, 2020

As Washington prepares for a new president who has pledged to rejoin the Iranian nuclear deal under certain conditions, its remaining signatories are discussing ways to salvage the landmark accord amid heightened tensions between Tehran and the West.

Representatives from China, France, Russia, Iran, Germany and the United Kingdom took part in a virtual meeting Wednesday chaired by senior European Union official Helga Schmid. A statement from the office of the EU’s high representative said participants of the joint commission discussed preserving the deal and “how to ensure the full and effective implementation of the agreement by all sides in light of existing challenges.” 

They also agreed to organize an informal ministerial-level meeting Monday. 

Since President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018, which lifted sanctions in exchange for Iran curbing its nuclear activity, Iran has steadily enriched its uranium stockpile and violated other terms of the agreement. 

If Iran returns to full compliance under the multinational deal, President-elect Joe Biden has pledged that the United States would reenter JCPOA as a starting point for follow-on negotiations. But an uptick in sanctions imposed by the Trump administration, combined with the suspected Israeli assassination an Iranian nuclear scientist last month, could complicate Biden’s pledge to rejoin the agreement. 

In apparent retaliation for the scientist’s killing, Iran’s hard-line parliament voted last month to increase uranium enrichment and ban UN inspectors from accessing Iran’s nuclear facilities if sanctions relief is not forthcoming by early February. The E3 grouping of France, Germany and the UK warned in a joint statement that the measure, if implemented, “risks compromising the important opportunity for a return to diplomacy with the incoming US administration.”

Iran’s execution last weekend of Ruhollah Zam, an Iranian dissident journalist based in Paris, created further tensions between Tehran and Europe. In a statement, the EU condemned his hanging “in the strongest terms” and called on Iran to uphold the due process rights of the accused. 

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani pushed back on the criticism this week, saying Zam’s execution was “unlikely” to harm Iran-European relations.