Russia says US sanctions won’t impede Iran atomic business

Russia says the US has provided “written guarantees” that sanctions imposed over the invasion of Ukraine won’t affect its nuclear supply agreements with Iran, potentially clearing the way for a resumption of talks to revive the 2015 atomic accord. Oil prices fell. 

World powers and Iran suspended their efforts to restore the nuclear landmark pact on Friday amid deepening tensions between the Kremlin and the White House. 

US officials confirmed they were considering sanctions against Russia’s Rosatom — the world’s biggest nuclear fuel maker — days after Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov demanded guarantees that such penalties wouldn’t be allowed to torpedo the Iran deal. 

“We received written guarantees,” Lavrov said on Tuesday after meeting his Iranian counterpart in Moscow, that “provide reliable protection for all projects and activities envisaged” in the nuclear deal.

Asked about Lavrov’s comments, a state department spokesperson said the US continues engaging Russia over the nuclear agreement and dismissed the possibility that sanctions against the Kremlin might impact nuclear fuel supplies for Iran.

“We would of course not sanction Russian participation in nuclear projects that are part of resuming full implementation,” the spokesperson said in an email.  

Potential breakthrough

The development raises the prospects that an agreement could still be clinched to limit Iran’s nuclear programme in return for sanctions relief that would bring Iranian oil back onto global markets roiled by the war in Ukraine.

Brent crude futures fell as much as $9.46 (R143) to trade as low as $97.44 (R1,473) in London after Lavrov’s comments. They had been trading above $100 (R1,512) for most of March.

In parallel to the diplomatic headway on the nuclear file there were also signals on Tuesday that Iran could release a dual British-Iranian charity worker who has been detained since 2016. Lawyers for Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe said they’re very hopeful their client will be released soon in a case linked to a long-standing UK government debt to Iran over a decades-old defence deal.

Before the Russian demand, diplomats from all sides had said they were very close to an agreement to restore the 2015 deal abandoned by then-US President Donald Trump four years ago. 

State department spokesperson Ned Price said on Monday it was up to Moscow and Tehran to decide whether a deal to revive the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was in reach within the coming days. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday the US knew Russia’s position and that it’s very important that nuclear diplomacy continues. 

“Russia has not caused any obstruction,” said Iranian foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian after the meeting with Lavrov. “Russia will continue a “very positive, constructive role” in supporting Iran if a deal is finalised, he said. 

Rosatom in focus

While US President Joe Biden’s administration has yet to decide on whether to sanction Rosatom, its business with Iran shows the potential for unintended consequences. The company is the world’s biggest supplier of nuclear reactors and fuel with projects stretching across Africa, Eurasia and Latin America. 

US sanctions guru Richard Nephew, who was among US. JCPOA negotiators until December, warned this past week that such measures carried a high risk of boomeranging back on enforcers. 

At the heart of the issue is Iran’s only operating nuclear power plant at the Persian Gulf port city of Bushehr. That Russian-built reactor relies on fuel assemblies provided by Rosatom, which is also building a second unit at the site that should be ready this decade. 

The JCPOA stipulates that Russia may continue supplying Iran’s Bushehr reactor, even as the Islamic Republic reduces its stockpile of enriched uranium to below 300kg.

Iran warned last year, however, that US sanctions risked forcing operations at Bushehr to shut down because payments couldn’t be transferred to Russian vendors. New sanctions against Moscow would threaten to further impair the partnership between the two countries, even under a restored agreement that lifted US sanctions on Iran.

Preventing Rosatom from fulfilling fuel supply contracts could encourage more countries to follow Iran’s lead and enrich uranium directly, Nephew wrote. Enrichment is the 75-year-old dual-use technology needed to fuel nuclear weapons and reactors. 

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com

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