Russia says JCPOA restoration within reach as Iran reminds US of onus to fix it

Russia’s permanent representative to the international organizations in Vienna says a consensus on the revival of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal is “within reach” as the parties to the agreement prepare to meet in the framework of the Joint Commission.

“The Joint Commission of JCPOA will meet on Sunday, June 20. It will decide on the way ahead at the Vienna Talks. An agreement on restoration of the nuclear deal is within reach but is not finalized yet,” Mikhail Ulyanov tweeted on Saturday, using an acronym for the official name of the nuclear accord, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

Also, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who has traveled to Turkey to take part in Antalya Diplomacy Forum in his tweet on Saturday night highlighted the responsibility of the United States, as the party that exited the nuclear deal and broke the agreement, to fix it.  

The European External Action Service (EEAS) said in a press release that the JCPOA Joint Commission will resume in the Austrian capital on Sunday, with representatives of China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and Iran in attendance.

The meeting will be chaired, on behalf of EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, by EEAS Deputy Secretary General/Political Director Enrique Mora, it added.

“Participants will continue their discussions in view of a possible return of the United States to the JCPOA and on how to ensure the full and effective implementation of the JCPOA,” according to the press release.

Iran, P4+1 likely to reach agreement on JCPOA revival before Rouhani’s administration leaves office: FM Zarif

Zarif says Iran and the P4+1 group of countries are very likely to agree on ways to revive the JCPOA before the end of President Rouhani’s office in mid-August.

In recent months, envoys from Iran and the P4+1 group of countries have been engaged in the Vienna talks aimed at returning the US to compliance.  

A US delegation is also in the Austrian capital, but it is not attending the discussions because the United States is not a party to the nuclear accord.

Former US president Donald Trump abandoned the deal in May 2018 and reimposed the anti-Iran sanctions that the JCPOA had lifted. He also placed additional sanctions on Iran under other pretexts not related to the nuclear case as part of the “maximum pressure” campaign.

Following a year of strategic patience, Iran resorted to its legal rights stipulated in Article 26 of the JCPOA, which grants a party the right to suspend its contractual commitments in case of non-compliance by other signatories, and let go of some of the restrictions imposed on its nuclear energy program. 

Now, the new US administration, under President Joe Biden, says it wants to compensate for Trump’s mistake and rejoin the deal, but it is showing an overriding propensity for maintaining some of the sanctions as a tool of pressure.

Tehran insists that all sanctions should first be removed in a verifiable manner before the Islamic Republic reverses its remedial measures.

US: Vienna talks made meaningful progress 

In a post on her Twitter account, Jennifer Hansler, a US State Department producer for CNN, quoted a spokesperson as saying that the Vienna talks have made “meaningful progress.”

"We would like to build on the meaningful progress achieved during the latest round of talks in Vienna," the tweet read.

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