How Russia Could Make or Break the Iran Deal
Washington wants to make sure the world will reimpose sanctions the second Tehran violates the terms of its agreement. But will Moscow surrender its treasured U.N. veto?
By Colum Lynch, John Hudson
June 24, 2015
There are few things in international diplomacy that Russia values more than its U.N. Security Council veto. It has wielded it to limit Western action from Georgia to Syria to Ukraine. But the success of the historic nuclear talks with Iran may hinge on Moscow’s willingness to voluntarily yield that power.
The United States and its European partners are pressing a proposal that would curtail Russia’s ability to block the U.N. Security Council’s ability to reimpose — or “snap back” — its sanctions on Iran if it breaches an accord placing strict limits on its ability to develop nuclear power, according to diplomats and analysts.
The Islamic Republic is being battered by three sets of sanctions: one package imposed by Washington, one by Europe, and one by the U.N. Security Council. The United States and European governments have multiple ways of reimposing, or snapping back, their own sanctions in the event of an Iranian breach. But it would be far more difficult for the United States and its partners to secure Russian and Chinese support for reimposing the separate multilateral U.N. measures.
Retaining the ability to restore the U.N. sanctions has emerged as a precondition for an American agreement to suspend, and eventually lift, a spate of measures that restrict governments’ business dealings with Tehran and demand the suspension of Iran’s uranium-enrichment sanctions. “We will not support a snap-back mechanism or an agreement that includes a snap-back mechanism that leaves us vulnerable” to Iranian cheating, Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, assured House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) at a June 16 hearing. “We will retain the ability to snap back multilateral sanctions architecture back in place without Russian or Chinese support.”
Power did not detail how the administration could ensure that suspended U.N. sanctions could be reimposed without the agreement of the two veto-wielding powers. But diplomats and specialists familiar with U.S. thinking said Washington has for months been exploring an option that would shift decision-making outside the U.N. Security Council.
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https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/06/24/how-russia-could-make-or-break-the-iran-deal/
