SpaceWar.com - Your World At War
Moscow says Iran nuclear deal must remain 'priority' for all sides
Moscow, Jan 6 (AFP) Jan 06, 2020
Moscow on Monday urged parties to the Iran nuclear deal to treat salvaging the agreement as a "priority", calling on European partners to fulfil their obligations to ensure Iran stays committed to the accord.

Tehran announced the latest rollback of its commitments under the 2015 accord on Sunday following the US assassination of a top general.

Russia is one of the five remaining parties in the deal following the pullout by the US in 2018, with the other four being Britain, China, France and Germany.

"Keeping the broad agreements and ensuring their sustained implementation must remain a priority task for all partners," the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.

It said the announcement by Tehran of a further rollback of its commitments, by foregoing the limit on the number of centrifuges, "does not carry any threat from the point of view of nuclear weapon proliferation".

Tehran has repeatedly said that the troubled deal can be rescued if parties can help it circumvent crippling US sanctions, and on Sunday it said it would return to its commitments if sanctions were lifted and Iran benefited.

Moscow pointed out "holes" in the approach to the deal by other parties. "We hope that the necessary outcomes will be achieved. A lot depends on our European colleagues," it said.

Russia "keeps full commitment" to the deal and is "ready to continue work" on it, the statement said, calling on "political will and a decisive collective response" from others.

"We are certain that when these challenges are overcome, the Iranian side will have no reason to deviate from the agreed-upon demands," it said.

Tensions between Tehran and Washington have spiked following the US drone strike in Iraq that killed Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.

Russia and Iran are allies in the conflict in Syria, having supported the Syrian government for years against the opposition, and Soleimani had been Iran's pointman in organising its forces and foreign proxies on the battlefield.

Russia's Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu on Monday spoke with the chief of Iranian General Staff Mohammad Bagheri on "avoiding escalation of the situation in Syria and the Middle East due to the murder" of Soleimani.


ADVERTISEMENT




Space News from SpaceDaily.com
Perseverance rover cleared for long distance Mars exploration
Origami style lunar rover wheel expands to climb steep caves
How to pick the right web testing framework for your project

24/7 Energy News Coverage
Conventional photon entanglement reveals thousands of hidden topologies in high dimensions
Bilayer tin oxide layer boosts back contact perovskite solar cell efficiency and stability
Brain like chips could cut AI power demand

Military Space News, Nuclear Weapons, Missile Defense
Rocket Lab advances US Space Force mission with early STP S30 launch
BlackSky accelerates Gen-3 satellite into full commercial service in three weeks
Leonardo DRS space radio completes first secure on orbit data transport test

24/7 News Coverage
Deep ocean quakes linked to Antarctic phytoplankton surges
Ocean warming drove past Greenland ice stream retreat
Insect radar survey finds vast summer air traffic above United States



All rights reserved. Copyright Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.