The United States has informed Iran through European Union mediators that the issue of linking Iran to the closure of the UN investigation into Iran’s undeclared nuclear activities and return to the 2015 nuclear deal may delay the lifting of US sanctions. According to the US website Axios, Wednesday, August 31, 2022, citing a US official and a think tank expert familiar with the negotiations.
The American website noted that the issue of the International Atomic Energy Agency investigation has become one of the two remaining obstacles in the negotiations to return to the 2015 nuclear deal.
According to this site, Tehran asked the International Atomic Energy Agency to close the investigation file related to uranium traces discovered by UN inspectors at several sites in Iran before the day of “returning to the implementation of the agreement”. 120 days after the signing of the new nuclear agreement.
The draft of the nuclear agreement presented by the European Union included the implementation of this agreement in several stages.
Sources familiar with the draft said that both parties agreed to proceed to the next stage after the full implementation of the measures they had committed to in the previous stage.
The third stage is the so-called “return to the implementation of the agreement day”, which is supposed to take place four months after the signing of the nuclear agreement.
These sources added that at this stage, Iran is supposed to have implemented all the restrictions imposed on its nuclear program and allowed the resumption of the full inspection regime of the International Atomic Energy Agency in its nuclear sites.
In return, the United States will cancel all secondary sanctions against Iran and take other measures in this field, including clarifying the necessary ways to facilitate business transactions with Iran for companies and the private sector.
On the other hand, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi said on Monday, August 9, that solving the International Atomic Energy Agency’s investigation issue is the cornerstone of any nuclear agreement, and without it, “talking about an agreement is meaningless.”
The time interval between the signing of the agreement and the return of Iran to the implementation of restrictions on its nuclear program is four months, and it is supposed to provide time to reach an agreement between the International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran in the field of research.
However, it is unlikely that Iran will agree to provide the clarifications it is requesting to the agency, which may ultimately lead to the suspension of the implementation process of the agreement.
That means sanctions on Iran will not be lifted until Iran returns to complying with restrictions on its nuclear program, a factor that US officials are relying on to pressure Iran into implementing the deal, even if the IAEA International Atomic Energy Agency does not close its research. .
“The agreement will be step-by-step, step-by-step, which means the Iranians will not get it all at once,” a US official said. There is no reason to associate it with the day of returning to the implementation of the agreement, and if Iran does this, it risks delaying the lifting of sanctions.
The US official claimed that the agreement could be implemented “quickly”, but that further written responses could be exchanged and that “may take some time”.
Source: Lebanon Debate
