How the resumption of the Iranian nuclear deal will affect Russia

The agreement on the Iranian nuclear program may be restored in the coming weeks. it will allow Tehran to resume oil exports to the world market, which is potentially capable of replacing Russian,

How the resuscitation of the deal on the Iranian nuclear program is being prepared

The countries that are parties to the agreement on the Iranian nuclear program (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action - JCPOA) can revive the deal in the coming weeks, Mikhail Ulyanov, HEAD of the Russian delegation at the JCPOA talks, Russia's permanent representative to international organizations in Vienna, said on Tuesday. Iran, the United States , RUSSIA , the United Kingdom, Germany, France and CHINA entered into an agreement in 2015 that provided for the lifting of sanctions on Tehran in exchange for limiting its nuclear program. The United States pulled out of the deal four years ago.

“The deal could take place as early as this week. Yesterday's development of events shows that this can indeed happen. Well, if not on this one, then on the next one, but in the near future, ”Ulyanov said on the air of Solovyov Live. According to him, an agreement on the restoration of the agreement can be formalized within the framework of the ministerial meeting of the Six.

The day before, Tehran handed over to Brussels a response to a draft agreement prepared by the European Union on the return of Iran and the United States to the JCPOA. The EU confirmed receipt of the response and said that they were studying it. According to the representative of the European Commission, Nabila Massrali, it is too early to talk about the timing of the consideration of the answer, the EU is consulting with other parties to the agreement. In particular, the US State Department reported on Tuesday that Brussels had handed over the responses of the Iranian side to Washington for study.

In early August, another round of negotiations on the restoration of the JCPOA was held in Vienna. The coordinator from the European Union proposed the final version of the deal, which the parties must sign if they agree. “What can be agreed upon, what was negotiated, is now in the final text. However, behind every technical issue and every point lies a political decision that needs to be made in the capitals. If these answers are positive, then we can sign this deal,” wrote the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, on his Twitter page.

Politico, citing an unnamed European official, said that Iran's response to the Brussels proposals mainly refers to unresolved issues in the field of sanctions and the provision of guarantees related to economic cooperation. Tehran, the source said, needs to be confident that it will be able to reap the economic benefits of the deal. The source also said that the document handed over by Iran does not contain requirements to terminate the IAEA investigation into undeclared nuclear material discovered in the country in 2019.

Earlier, The Wall Street Journal wrote that the European Union offered Iran a number of steps to complete the investigation. Tehran has repeatedly insisted on its completion. Politico also points out that the response received from Tehran "indicates that Iran wants to continue negotiations on some aspects of the draft text and does not give a final answer whether it accepts or rejects the agreement presented by the EU a week ago in Vienna."

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The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on the Iranian nuclear program was agreed in 2015 after years of negotiations between Russia, the US, France, the UK, China and Iran. It provided for the lifting of sanctions on the Islamic Republic in exchange for limiting its nuclear program and guarantees that it would not develop nuclear weapons. In May 2018, the 45th US President Donald Trump decided to withdraw from the JCPOA and restore US sanctions .regarding Iran. In turn, Tehran began to gradually reduce its obligations under the agreement, including those related to uranium enrichment indicators and the number of centrifuges. The Joe Biden administration has indicated interest in returning to the deal. After that, negotiations began in Vienna to restore the JCPOA, but they were irregular.

How the return to the JCPOA will affect Russia

An agreement on the resumption of the JCPOA can be reached in the near future - both Iran and the United States are ready to compromise, said Vladimir Sazhin, a senior researcher at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences. “I think that the deal will soon be concluded, because Iran badly needs it, or rather the lifting of sanctions. The US also needs a deal as it will be a big foreign policy victory for [US President Joe] Biden on the eve of the midterm congressional elections in November,” he told RBC. The expert emphasized that all participants in the talks have serious work to do. Despite the fact that Tehran's response to Brussels is not publicly available, Sazhin suggested that it raised questions about the mechanism for lifting sanctions against Iran and financial and economic guarantees, which the US must give to the Islamic Republic in case it withdraws from the deal. According to the expert, Iran also declares its disagreement with the fact that the version of the agreement proposed by Brussels is final, and that it is ready to discuss the identified issues.

Sazhin recalled that all parties to the agreement insisted that the JCPOA should be adopted in its original form, that is, in the 2015 version, but that document provided for a certain period of validity of certain requirements for Iran, from 5 to 25 years on various points of the agreement. “Seven years have passed since the conclusion of the agreement. This issue is to be resolved. In accordance with the old JCPOA, many requirements for Iran have been nullified, and Iran has only a few years to fulfill others,” he explained.

Over the past two or three years, the level of development of Iran's nuclear infrastructure has increased dramatically and is now many times higher than in July 2015, Sazhin continued. “Now Iran is capable of enriching uranium up to 60%, and the weapons level is 90%. He also accumulated a significant amount of enriched uranium up to 5%, up to 20% and up to 60%. In accordance with the JCPOA, it could store no more than 300 kg of uranium enriched to 3.67%. The big question is how the reconstruction of the entire nuclear infrastructure of Iran will be carried out to harmonize with the requirements of the JCPOA of 2015,” the expert said.

Sazhin believes that the identified issues will be mentioned in the agreement on the resumption of the Iranian nuclear deal, which must be signed by the foreign ministers of the "six", and that a mechanism will be created to resolve them.

The expert noted that the European Union has its own interests in the renewal of the agreement with Iran. “Why has the European Union begun to actively engage in the issue of the rapid restoration of the JCPOA and the lifting of sanctions against Iran? As far as I understand, the first point of lifting sanctions will be Iran's oil industry, that is, it will be able to freely EXPORT oil to the world market. And the possibilities of its export are now huge, Tehran has accumulated a large amount of oil, some tankers are even laid up and used as oil storage facilities. In the current situation, when Russia is also under sanctions, including oil sanctions, and the amount of Russian oil in the EU is sharply decreasing, Iranian oil can replace it,” he admitted.

The big question is how sustainable the removal of Iran from sanctions will be, said Ivan Timofeev, program DIRECTOR of the Russian International Affairs Council. He recalled that at the conclusion of the JCPOA, the then US President Barack Obama withdrew Iran from sanctions by his decree. There was no international agreement, since the US Senate was against the JCPOA itself. That is why Trump was able to easily cancel US commitments to Iran. “Now the question arises from Tehran to what extent the United States is ready to guarantee the stability of the deal. There is a web of laws that the President of the United States cannot get around when it comes to implementing sanctions. They can only be abolished or modified by Congress. It’s not a fact that he will go for it, ”the expert said.

Timofeev noted that Russian diplomacy is actively promoting the resumption of the JCPOA, but this carries a number of risks for Moscow. “The Americans are also counting on it. If Iranian oil enters the market, then its volume and supply on the market will increase and the price will decrease, which Washington considers important for containing Russia,” he concluded.