VIENNA: The remaining parties to the faltering Iran nuclear deal will meet in Vienna on Wednesday in their first gathering after Britain, France and Germany launched a dispute process over Tehran’s successive pullbacks.
The meeting comes as the parties try to find a way to save the landmark 2015 agreement, which has been crumbling since the US withdrew from it in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions on Iran.
The Europeans hope to persuade Tehran to come back into line with the deal curbing Iran’s nuclear program after Tehran made a series of steps away in protest at the US pull-out.
Wednesday’s meeting at political directors’ level, convening the commission set up by the deal, will be chaired by EU senior official Helga Schmid.
“This is a chance though not of 100 percent to stop escalation before it is too late,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quoted as saying by the Russian Embassy in Vienna on Twitter.
In its last announcement in early January, Tehran said it would no longer observe limits on the number of centrifuges used to enrich uranium.
It was its fifth step away from the deal since US President Donald Trump’s withdrawal and led to Germany, Britain and France triggering the dispute process on January 14.
The process spells out several steps, the last one of which is notifying the UN Security Council. UN sanctions would then automatically “snap back” after 30 days unless the Security Council voted to stop it.
A diplomat speaking on condition of anonymity said that no time table had been fixed for solving the dispute, adding “we are still far from a result.”
“We all want to save the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as the deal is known) so that the inspectors can continue their work in Iran,” the diplomat said, referring to the inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
The Vienna-based UN nuclear agency has been tasked with monitoring the deal’s implementation and issues regular reports, the latest of which is expected within days.
Western diplomats recognize it is highly unlikely Iran will heed calls to come back into full compliance without substantial concessions in return — such as an end to US sanctions or Europe taking measures to offset their economic impact.
But they hope the use of the dispute process will convince Iran not to make any more moves away from the deal, giving space for back-channel diplomacy aimed at bringing Washington and Tehran back into alignment.
The diplomat said that Iran could also “at least freeze its uranium stocks” as a possible positive outcome of the current discussions.
At a major international security conference in Munich earlier this month, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Tehran would be prepared to move back toward the deal if Europe provides “meaningful” economic benefits.
Europe has set up a special trading mechanism called Instex to try to enable legitimate humanitarian trade with Iran, but it has yet to complete any transactions and Tehran regards it as inadequate.
The renewed US sanctions have almost entirely isolated Iran from the international financial system, driven away oil buyers and plunged the country into a severe recession.
Iran nuclear deal commission meets to try to save 2015 accord
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Iran nuclear deal commission meets to try to save 2015 accord
- Landmark agreement pact has been crumbling since the US withdrew from it in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions on Iran
- Renewed US sanctions have almost entirely isolated Iran from the international financial system
Iran launches new attacks at Gulf Arab countries as it keeps up pressure on the region
- In addition to firing missiles and drones at Israel and American bases in the region, Iran has also been targeting energy infrastructure
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: Iran launched new attacks Tuesday at Gulf Arab countries as it keeps up pressure on the region, while five pro-Iranian militants were killed in an airstrike northern Iraq.
Incoming missile sirens sounded early in the morning in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, while Saudi Arabia said it had destroyed two drones over its oil-rich eastern region and Kuwait’s National Guard said it had show down six drones.
In addition to firing missiles and drones at Israel and American bases in the region, Iran has also been targeting energy infrastructure which, combined with its stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz, has sent oil prices soaring.
Brent crude, the international standard, spiked to nearly $120 on Monday before falling back but was still at around $90 a barrel on Tuesday, nearly 24 percent higher than when the war started on Feb. 28.
US President Donald Trump, who has previously said that the war could last for a month or longer, on Tuesday sought to downplay growing fears that it could be a long-term regional conflict, saying it was “going to be a short-term excursion.”
Trump sends contradictory messages as Tehran says it’s prepared for a long war
The war has choked off major supplies of oil and gas to world markets and sent fuel prices rising across the US The fighting has also led foreigners to flee from business hubs and prompted millions to seek shelter as bombs hit military bases, government buildings, oil and water installations, hotels and at least one school.
Iran has effectively stopped tankers from using the Strait of Hormuz, the shipping lane between the Arabian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman — the gateway to the Indian Ocean — through which 20 percent of the world’s oil is carried. Attacks on merchant ships near the strait have killed at least seven sailors, according to the International Maritime Organization.
In a post on social media on Tuesday, Trump seemed not to acknowledge that, saying that “If Iran does anything that stops the flow of Oil within the Strait of Hormuz, they will be hit by the United States of America TWENTY TIMES HARDER than they have been hit thus far.”
In an apparent response to Trump’s remarks published in Iranian state media, a spokesperson for the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, Ali Mohammad Naini, said “Iran will determine when the war ends.”
Kamal Kharazi, foreign policy adviser to the office of the supreme leader, told CNN on Monday that Iran is prepared for a long war. He said he sees no “room for diplomacy anymore” unless economic pressure prompts other countries to intervene and stop the “aggression of Americans and Israelis against Iran.”
Airstrike on Iran-linked militia in Iraq kills five
As the conflict has spread against the region, Israel has launched multiple attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Iranian-linked militia has responded by firing missiles into Israel.
Pro-Iran militias in Iraq have also launched attacks at US bases in the country since the beginning of the conflict.
Early Tuesday, one of those militias, the 40th Brigade of the Popular Mobilization Forces in the city of Kirkuk, was hit with an airstrike that killed at least five militants and wounded four others, according to officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to brief reporters.
It was not immediately clear who was behind the strikes.
Since the war began, at least 1,230 people have been killed in Iran, at least 397 in Lebanon and 11 in Israel, according to officials.
A total of seven US service members have been killed.
Financial markets, which swung wildly in recent days, opened the day Tuesday in Asia with early gains, building on late optimism in the US
