Russian envoy says Iran and P5+1 will look into implementing Iran deal

VIENNA, January 9. /TASS/. Iran and P5+1 (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany) will meet in Vienna on January 10 for a session of the Joint Commission to look into implementing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, known commonly as the Iran nuclear deal), Russia’s Permanent Representative to International Organizations in Vienna, Vladimir Voronkov, told TASS on Monday. Issues on the implementation of the JCPOA one year after it came into effect on January 16, 2016 are on the agenda. "Results will be summed up and current issues of the implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action will be considered," said the Russian diplomat who will represent Russia at the upcoming session. Focusing on Washington’s extension of sanctions against Iran in December 2016, Voronkov said that Washington and Tehran remained in permanent negotiations on the issue, as it concerns bilateral relations. Russia sees the JCPOA as a major document for maintaining stability in its global dimension and assumes that the sanctions will not affect the agreement’s implementation he said. According to the diplomat, "the document itself has proved very efficient, that is why we would not want to see problems not directly related to the Comprehensive Agreement influencing its implementation." Speaking about US President-elect Donald Trump’s stance on the Iran deal, the Russian envoy said "at the moment nobody knows the president-elect’s political program. "The election campaign is one thing, but a new stage when he enters office is another. Then he will get an opportunity to have another look at the document, to the practice of its implementation to find his position on it in the future," he said. "We assume that the American side will deeply analyze how this agreement is implemented. In our view and not only in it, it is implemented very efficiently," he said, adding that IAEA inspectors confirm this. On July 14, 2015 the final Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) for the Iranian nuclear program was sealed on July 14, 2015. Iran pledged to produce non-weapons-grade plutonium, to have no more than 300 kg of uranium enriched to 3.67% for a period of fifteen years, reequip its nuclear facilities and use them exclusively for peaceful purposes. The weapons embargo imposed by the UN Security Council will remain effective for five years, the ban on the supply of ballistic technologies to Iran, for eight years and IAEA specialists will be inspecting Iranian nuclear facilities for 25 years. On January 16, 2016 the United Nations, the United States and the European Union lifted their economic and financial restrictions on Iran that they had imposed over its nuclear program. The US decrees on sanctions were suspended but not canceled altogether. During his election campaign, Trump described the Obama Administration’s nuclear agreement with Iran as a disgrace to the United States. He vowed to achieve its revision, should he be elected president. Read more