Expectations of any additional agreements to revive the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran’s nuclear program are unrealistic under current circumstances, with little more than a year to go until the 2024 US presidential election, Lavrov told reporters on Thursday.
"I doubt it would be very realistic to expect this (revival of the JCPOA), with a new administration [potentially] coming to power in the United States in a year’s time," he said. "Who knows whether that administration will be Democratic or Republican. And nobody can guarantee that this new administration would refrain from using the trick of withdrawing from the agreement again," TASS quoted him as saying.
According to the top Russian diplomat, the JCPOA was simply killed by the United States, which, "despite all requirements under the UN Charter, refused to implement the resolution, adopted by the consensus," which finalized this agreement. "When the new administration of Biden came to power, they said they were ready to restore the program <…>, but instead of making a decision to fully revive the resolution and the JCPOA itself, they have been bargaining <…> for something extra from Tehran," Lavrov lamented.
The JCPOA was signed in 2015 between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany. Former US President Donald Trump illegally pulled out of the deal in 2018 while the current US President, Joe Biden, has signaled that he is ready to resurrect the agreement.
Russia, the UK, Germany, China, the US, and France have been in talks with Iran since April 2021 to reinstate the deal.
The talks to salvage the JCPOA kicked off in the Austrian capital of Vienna in April 2021, with the intention of examining Washington’s seriousness in rejoining the deal and removing anti-Iran sanctions.
The negotiations have been at a standstill since August due to Washington’s insistence on its hard-nosed position of not removing all the sanctions that were slapped on the Islamic Republic by the previous US administration. Iran maintains it is necessary for the other side to offer some guarantees that it will remain committed to any agreement that is reached.
MP/PR