With U.S. elections just two months away, China, Europe and Russia played for time in an attempt to prevent the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran from descending into even deeper conflict.
The commission responsible for resolving disputes
under the Iran nuclear deal met Tuesday in the Vienna palace where the landmark
agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was sealed’ five
years ago. It was the first meeting of envoys from signatory states since the
United Nations Security Council rejected U.S. attempts to restore international
sanctions, and follows new impetus to widen nuclear inspections inside the
Persian Gulf country.
“All the delegations expressed their
commitment to the JCPOA,” Fu Cong, China’s top non-proliferation diplomat, said
in a press briefing. The countries coordinated how they’ll deal with U.S.
threats to snap back international sanctions and discussed expanding access to
the European Union’s Instex payment channel, which was designed’ to enable companies
to avoid American penalties, he said.
Though American diplomats weren’t in the
meetings at the Palais Coburg -- Washington pulled out of the deal in 2018 --
the U.S. presidential election just 63 days away weighed on the decisions.
China, France, Germany, Iran, Russia and
the U.K. still want to keep the 2015 accord, which was supposed to cap Tehran’s
nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief. President Donald Trump’s
decision to quit the pact and reimpose U.S. sanctions threatened to scuttle the
agreement. Iran responded by violating limits on the amount of nuclear fuel
it’s allowed’ to produce under the deal, forcing European participants to
contain repercussions by triggering the agreement’s so-called Dispute
Resolution Mechanism.
Tuesday’s meeting was a follow-up to that
move.
All of the countries present rejected the
Trump administration attempts to snap back UN sanctions on Iran because the
U.S. “had not participated in any JCPOA-related activities” since ceasing to
take part in the accord, the EU chair of the meeting reported late Tuesday. The
deal remains “a key element of the global nuclear non-proliferation
architecture,” read the statement.
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas
Araghchi also met with International Atomic Energy Agency Director General
Rafael Mariano Grossi, according to state-run Islamic Republic News Agency.
Iran agreed last week to allow international monitors to visit two sites that
may have hosted atomic work two decades ago. Russia’s IAEA envoy Mikhail Ulyanov
said following the meeting that all sides are “determined to do their best to
preserve” the nuclear deal, according to a post on Twitter.
“The tension had been building over the
summer but they’re now in a better position than they were two months ago to
buy some more time,” said Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova, a director at the Vienna
Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, who advises diplomats on policy.
Pressure in the Gulf has risen over the last year as tit-for-tat ship seizures
and facility attacks have threatened to spill into open military conflict.
Three Dates to Watch
Sept. 20 The
date that Secretary of State Michael Pompeo says the U.S. is unilaterally ready
to snap back, even in the absence of Security Council deliberation
Oct. 18 The
date the arms embargo against Iran expires, permitting Tehran to import and
export conventional weapons
Nov. 3 The
U.S. presidential election. Trump remains opposed to the JCPOA. Democratic
challenger Joe Biden has suggested he’d consider rejoining the accord
China’s Fu, a director general in the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, also called on Iran to “come back into full
compliance” with the nuclear accord, promising it “economic benefits” in
return.
The middle way that European countries
have been trying to adhere to has become increasingly difficult, according to
two of the bloc’s officials who asked not to be identified’. The European Union
wants to maintain the nuclear deal while continuing to deny Iran access to
conventional weapons. It’s increasingly focused’ on the U.S. election calendar
and the possibility that a Democratic victory in November could revive what’s
left of the multilateral accord.
“It is quite amazing that the JCPOA, even
if just hanging by a thread, is still in existence,” Wendy Sherman, former U.S.
nuclear envoy and one of the chief architects of the 2015 deal, said in an
interview. “We thought that the JCPOA could have this kind of durability but I
don’t think anyone quite knew.”
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