Category Archives: Iran nuclear deal

Iran announces official end to 10-year-old nuclear agreement

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Tehran terminates 2015 deal under which sanctions were lifted in return for curbs on country’s nuclear programme

An international deal with Iran designed to keep the world safe from the spread of atomic weapons has officially ended, with Tehran announcing the termination of the decade-old agreement.

Iran said on Saturday that it was no longer bound by the 2015 agreement, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), under which international sanctions were lifted in exchange for limitations on Tehran’s nuclear programme.

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Iran angry as sweeping UN sanctions take effect after failure of nuclear talks

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Foreign ministry attacks ‘unjustifiable’ return of measures expected to have wide effects on troubled economy

Widespread UN sanctions against Iran have come back into force for the first time in a decade, prompting anger from Tehran, after last-ditch nuclear talks with western powers failed to produce a breakthrough.

The sanctions, which came into effect late on Saturday and three months after Israel and the US bombed Iran, bar dealings related to Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missiles programme and are also expected to have wider effects on the country’s troubled economy.

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Iran snapback sanctions loom as UN security council set to vote on nuclear programme

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Russian efforts to delay the return of sanctions is expected to fail during vote on Friday

A final Russian attempt to defer the snapback of large-scale UN sanctions on Iran is expected to fail at the UN security council on Friday after European countries rejected last-minute Iranian offers to give UN weapons inspectors limited access to its bombed nuclear sites.

Russia will call for the reimposition of the sanctions to be deferred for six months to give more time for diplomacy, but European diplomats are confident that Russia will not get the nine votes it needs on the security council for the snapback to be deferred. The last time Russia put the same issue to a vote it received only four votes.

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UN inspectors can resume work at Iran nuclear sites after breakthrough deal

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Rafael Grossi, IAEA director general, says agreement with Tehran is ‘important step in the right direction’

Tehran and the UN nuclear inspectorate have reached an agreement that will allow UN inspectors to return to inspect all of Iran’s nuclear sites, including those bombed by Israel and the US in June.

The breakthrough, confirmed by Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, came during a three-hour meeting on Monday between Grossi and the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, in Cairo.

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Iran accuses Europe of stepping aside and letting Trump dictate nuclear deal terms

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Foreign ministry official says US will be dictating what happens once UN-wide sanctions are reimposed

Europe is on the verge of abandoning its role as a mediator between the US and Iran and instead handing the Iran nuclear file over to Donald Trump’s veto, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson has said in an interview with the Guardian in Tehran.

Esmail Baghaei said that as soon as UN-wide sanctions were reimposed at Europe’s demand in less than 30 days’ time, the US would regain its security council veto over what happens next, including the continuance of sanctions.

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Return of UN nuclear inspectors to Iran met with protests by MPs

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Some Iranian officials say readmission breaches law passed after Israel and the US attacked the country in June

The partial return of UN inspectors to Iran for the first time since Israel and the US attacked Iran’s nuclear sites has been met with protests by officials in Tehran, who claim the strict preconditions they set have been breached. Some even described the return as criminal.

Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, tried to quell the backlash by saying the inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) would not be visiting any of the bombed sites and that discussions about these were still to be had.

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Russia could back delay to ‘snapback’ of nuclear sanctions against Iran

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Moscow willing to support six-month extension of deadline before punishments are reimposed, reports suggest

Russia could back an extended six-month deadline for its ally Iran before European powers reimpose sweeping United Nations sanctions over Tehran’s refusal to allow UN inspectors back into nuclear sites after the Israeli-US assault in June.

France, Britain and Germany – known as the E3 – have long threatened to trigger a “snapback” of sanctions at the UN security council before 18 October, when a largely defunct nuclear deal struck 10 years ago between Tehran and major powers expires.

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Europe gives Iran deadline to contain nuclear programme or see sanctions reinstated

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UK, France and Germany say without firm commitment from Iran by 29 August they will reapply embargos that were lifted 10 years ago

The EU will start the process of reinstating UN sanctions on Iran from 29 August if Tehran has made no progress by then on containing its nuclear programme, the bloc has announced.

Speaking at a meeting of his EU counterparts, the French foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said: “France and its partners are … justified in reapplying global embargos on arms, banks and nuclear equipment that were lifted 10 years ago. Without a firm, tangible and verifiable commitment from Iran, we will do so by the end of August at the latest.”

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Europe urged to raise plight of Iran’s political prisoners in any future talks

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Rights activists say Tehran’s crackdown must be on agenda in any talks on future relations between Europe and Iran

Iranian human rights groups are urging MEPs and European governments to escalate the issue of Tehran’s mistreatment of political prisoners, arguing that the crackdown on internal dissent must be on the agenda in any talks about future relations between Europe and Iran.

The Iranian foreign ministry appears to be in no rush to stage further talks with the west without clear US assurances that it will not be attacked again.

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Europe is scrambling to form a united front and regain relevance in the Iran crisis

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Tehran now places little faith in the European countries who played a key role in brokering the Iranian nuclear deal

Exposed as divided and marginalised during the Iran crisis, European nations are scrambling to retrieve a place at the Middle East negotiating table, fearing an impulsive Donald Trump has diminishing interest in stabilising Iran or the wider region now he believes he has achieved his key objective of wiping out Tehran’s nuclear programme.

On Tuesday the EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, was the latest senior European figure to phone the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, offering to be a facilitator and urging Tehran not to leave the crisis in a dangerous limbo by keeping UN weapons inspectors out of Iran.

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Iran says diplomacy with US only possible if Israeli aggression stops

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Foreign minister Abbas Araghchi says he supports more talks with European counterparts despite lack of progress

Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has said that his country is ready for more diplomacy with the US only if Israel’s war on his country is brought to an end “and the aggressor is held accountable for the crimes he committed”.

After several hours of talks with European foreign ministers in Geneva on Friday, there was no sign of a diplomatic breakthrough – or a resumption of negotiations with the US.

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Iran says it will release Israeli nuclear secrets as pressure grows to reimpose sanctions

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Tehran threat comes as European powers press for vote that could lead to reimposition of UN sanctions

Iran has said it will soon start releasing information from a hoard of Israeli nuclear secrets it claims to have obtained, as European countries push for a vote this week on reimposing UN sanctions on Tehran over its nuclear programme.

The unverified claims by Iranian intelligence of a massive leak of Israeli secrets may be designed to turn the focus away from what Iran argues is its own excessively monitored civil nuclear programme.

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Trump says he warned Israel against attack on Iran as nuclear deal ‘very close’

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US president claims he told Tel Aviv he thought agreement on Tehran’s nuclear programme could come within weeks

Donald Trump has claimed he warned Israel against attacking Iran because he believed he was very close to a deal on Tehran’s nuclear programme in which US inspectors will be given unparalleled access to sites to ensure the country is not planning to build a nuclear bomb.

At a White House press conference on Wednesday, the US president confirmed he held talks last week with Israel and told them it was “not appropriate” to attack Tehran because he believed he could reach a deal within weeks.

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Iran would view US as ‘participant’ in any Israeli attack on its nuclear sites

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Warning issued after US intelligence reportedly understood Israel might attack if Iran-US talks broke down

Iran has said it will hold the US responsible for any Israeli attack on its nuclear sites in remarks that set a fraught backdrop for the fifth and probably most important round of talks between Iran and the US on the future of Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, issued the warning on Thursday after reports appeared in the American media claiming US intelligence understood Israel was planning an attack on Iranian nuclear sites – with or without American support – if the talks broke down.

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Iran proposes partnership with UAE and Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium

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A consortium would help Tehran deal with US objections and tie in Gulf states to its enrichment programme

Iran has floated the idea of a consortium of Middle Eastern countries, including Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), to enrich uranium as a way of overcoming some US objections to Iran continuing to have its own enrichment programme.

The proposal would be one way of locking the Gulf states into supporting the Iranian position that it must be continued to be allowed to enrich.

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Moscow may gain key role in Iran nuclear deal as US talks progress

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Russia touted as possible destination for Iran’s uranium stockpile and could also act as arbiter of deal breaches

Russia could play a key role in a deal on the future of Iran’s nuclear programme, with Moscow being touted not only as a possible destination for Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, but also as a possible arbiter of deal breaches.

Donald Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers in 2018 during his first term, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.

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Trump’s bombing threat over Iran nuclear programme prompts backlash

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Iranian officials accuse US president of breaching UN charter and say ‘violence brings violence’

Iran has reacted with outrage after Donald Trump said the country will be bombed if it does not accept US demands to constrain its nuclear programme.

The US president said on Sunday that if Iran “[doesn’t] make a deal, there will be bombing. It will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before.”.

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Netanyahu seeks to draw Trump into future attack on Iranian nuclear sites

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Israeli PM urges US to help ‘finish the job’ as Washington makes early maximalist demand over Tehran’s programme

Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that, with Donald Trump’s support, his government will “finish the job” of neutralising the threat from Iran, amid US reports that Israel is considering airstrikes against Iranian nuclear sites in the coming few months.

Trump has said he would prefer to make a deal with Tehran, but also made clear that he was considering US military action if talks failed, and his administration has laid down an early maximalist demand: Iranian abandonment of its entire nuclear programme.

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Donald Trump signals wish to hold talks with Iran over nuclear deal

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US president’s remarks will spark divisions within Iran over country’s nuclear ambitions and sanctions

Donald Trump has said he wants a “verified nuclear peace agreement” with Iran and denied he wanted to blow Iran to smithereens, describing such reports as “greatly exaggerated”.

But he said it was essential that Iran did not have a nuclear weapon, adding “we should start working on it immediately”. His remarks on his social media site, Truth Social represent the clearest sign that Trump is willing to hold talks with Iran to try to replace the nuclear deal signed in 2015, but from which Trump pulled the US out in 2018.

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Top Iranian politician appeals to Trump to restart nuclear deal negotiations

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Mohammad Javad Zarif says he hopes new Trump administration will be more serious, focused and realistic

A senior Iranian politician has appealed to Donald Trump to begin new negotiations with Tehran over its civil nuclear programme, saying: “I hope that this time around, [Trump 2.0] will be more serious, more focused, more realistic.”

Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s vice-president for strategic affairs, pointed out that the returning US president had not reappointed figures from his first term such as the former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and national security adviser John Bolton, who persuaded him in 2018 to quit the nuclear deal on the basis that withdrawal would lead to the regime’s collapse.

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