Last night, President Hassan Rouhani announced that Iran will take the third step towards diminishing its JCPOA-related commitments on Friday, as the European sides to the deal failed to live up to their commitments in the two-month deadline they had been given.
“These activities we consider inconsistent with the JCPOA,” the European Commission spokesman Carlos Martin Ruiz de Gordejuela said in a media briefing in Brussels today, according to AFP.
In the face of lack of action by the other parties to safeguard Iran's legitimate rights stipulated in the deal, on May 8, the anniversary of the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal (JCPOA), Iran announced that it was partially discontinuing its obligations under the JCPOA and urged nuclear deal remaining signatories – China, France, Germany, Russia and the United Kingdom – to shield Tehran from Washington's sanctions.
Tehran says its countermeasures fit within its rights under paragraphs 26 and 36 of the nuclear deal, and that it will reverse the measures once its demands are met.
As a first step, Iran increased its enriched uranium stockpile to a level above the 300 kilograms set by the JCPOA. In the second step, Tehran began enriching uranium to purity rates beyond the JCPOA-limit of 3.76 percent.
The Iranian President said on Wednesday that the country will expand its nuclear research and development as the third step to scale back on its JCPOA obligations.
Details of the third step will be announced on Saturday by the country’s nuclear energy organization.
KI