VIENNA, Austria (Washington Insider Magazine) – The EU’s foreign policy chief believes “a pause” is required in ongoing discussions with world powers over Iran’s shattered nuclear deal, blaming the delay on “external factors.”
Josep Borrell’s remarks came on Friday as a deal looked to be in the works for the US to rejoin an agreement it unilaterally pulled from in 2018, and also for Iran to rein down its quickly progressing nuclear programme.
While Borrell did not clarify, according to Al Jazeera, Russia this week linked the ongoing talks to sanctions imposed on Moscow as a result of its assault on Ukraine.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, is the official name of the 2015 nuclear deal. For months, negotiations have been ongoing in Vienna to find a mechanism to resurrect the agreement.
A pause in discussions with international powers to resurrect the deal, Iran’s foreign office said on Friday, may benefit the negotiations.
On Thursday, Department Of State spokesperson Ned Price claimed the U.S. was close to reaching an agreement — it’s just a matter of resolving a few minor concerns.
However, Russian Foreign Affairs minister Sergey Lavrov indicated last week that he required assurances that the U.S. sanctions would not harm Moscow’s contacts with Tehran, at least at the position of the secretary of state.
This cast doubt on months of talks aimed at repairing the accord, which saw Tehran agree to dramatically reduce its uranium enrichment in exchange for the relaxation of economic sanctions.
Under the 2015 nuclear deal, Iran agreed to store advanced centrifuges under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), while maintaining its uranium enrichment at 3.67 percent purity and a stockpile of only 300 kilogrammes (661 pounds).
It also ceased enrichment at its Fordo nuclear site, which is located underground. However, in 2018, then-President Trump abruptly withdrew the United States from the agreement, following through on a campaign promise to rip it up since it did not confront Iran’s ballistic missile development or backing for regional militias.
As a series of increasing strikes put the greater Middle East on alert in 2019, Iran started methodically breaching all of the agreement’s limits.