Washington and its European allies agreed that the end of August will be the deadline for Iran to sign a new nuclear deal.
According to Axios, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the foreign ministers of France, Germany, and the UK set the deadline during a call on Monday. The plan calls for using the “snapback” mechanism to reimpose international sanctions that were lifted by the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.
Under that agreement, Iran agreed to scale back its civilian nuclear energy program as well as consent to intrusive inspections to ensure Tehran was not working on a secret nuclear weapons program. In exchange, the UN sanctions on Iran were lifted.
The Iran deal included a “snapback” provision that would reimpose all sanctions on Tehran if a majority of the parties to the agreement voted that the Islamic Republic was in violation. The initial signatories to the deal were the US, Iran, UK, France, Germany, Russia, and China.
While Tehran was abiding by the agreement, in 2018, President Donald Trump withdrew from the deal and imposed unilateral sanctions on Iran.
Rubio and the other diplomats set the end of August as the deadline, as the “snapback” mechanism is scheduled to expire in October.
It’s unclear what Iran will have to do to avoid the sanctions. Washington is demanding that Tehran completely dismantle its nuclear enrichment program. However, sources speaking with Axios said that Iran could avoid the international sanctions by allowing inspections of its nuclear program and exporting its 60% enriched uranium.
Iran ended cooperation with the international nuclear watchdog after the US and Israel bombed the Islamic Republic for 12 days last month.
Iranian officials are hesitant to re-engage in talks with Washington. Starting in April, the Islamic Republic engaged in several rounds of talks with the Trump administration aimed at establishing a new nuclear agreement. Those negotiations ended when Israel started bombing Iran on June 13.
