That is a New York Times headline story on July 17, 2025. They write that the Europeans intent is to’ push Iran into renewed negotiations on restricting their nuclear program.’ Why are the Europeans making Steve Witkoff’s deal making more difficult by bringing up ‘snapback’ sanctions? This blog will give the full story on what the “Europeans” are messing with.
Barak Ravid of Axios gave a good report on July 15: ‘U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the foreign ministers of France, Germany and the U.K [E3]. agreed on July 15 that the end of August is the deadline for reaching a nuclear deal with Iran. If no deal, E3 plan to trigger the "snapback" mechanism that automatically reimposes all UN Security Council sanctions that were lifted under the JCPOA. The snapback provision will expire [with UNSC/RES/2231 (2015) on October 18]. The process of activating "snapback" takes 30 days, and E3 want to conclude the process before Russia assumes the UN Security Council presidency in October.’
'Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week at the White House asked Trump not to block snapback. A senior U.S. official said the Trump administration supports activating snapback and sees it as leverage in the talks with Iran.'
'Iranians argue there is no legal basis to reimpose the sanctions and have threatened to withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in response’.
My June 7 blog goes into detail on ‘snapback’, calling it a “tempest in a cup of tea.” It seems necessary to revisit the ‘snapback’ tempest.
• Let us recall: 'Russian U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia - in a [December 9, 2024,] letter [to UNSC] - said [E3] had no right to invoke the "snap back" of sanctions and that it was irresponsible of them to suggest the possibility of using the "snap back" mechanism'.
• Bartak Ravid is wrong in writing “The process of activating ‘snapback’ takes 30 days.” The first step in the process defined in UNSC/RES/2231 (2025) - Dispute Resolution Mechanism- paragraph 36 would be a request by E3 for a meeting of the JCPOA Joint Commission.
Let’s see what this JCPOA Joint Commission is all about. JCPOA Annex IV, titled Joint Commission, specifies in detail how it functions. The provisions relevant to an E3 complaint are as follows:
1. Establishment, Composition, and Coordinator
1.4. The High Representative of the [European] Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy … will serve as the Coordinator of the Joint Commission.
2. Functions
2.1.14. Review, with a view to resolving, any issue that a JCPOA participant believes
constitutes nonperformance by another JCPOA participant of its commitments
under the JCPOA, according to the process outlined in the JCPOA [paragraphs 36-37];
3. Procedures
3.1. The Joint Commission will meet … at any time upon request of a JCPOA participant to the Coordinator. The Coordinator will convene a meeting of the Joint Commission to be held no later than one week following receipt of such a request, except for ,,, any other matter that the Coordinator and/or a JCPOA participant deem urgent, in which
case the meeting will be convened as soon as possible and not later than three
calendar days from receipt of the request.
3.2. Meetings of the Joint Commission will be held in New York, Vienna, or Geneva as
appropriate.
4. Decisions
4.1 … decisions by the Joint Commission are to be made by consensus.
What would that mean if E3 does submit a complaint about Iran’s nonperformance to the Joint Commission Coordinator?
Note: 2.1.14, Review, with a view to resolving, and 4.1, decisions…made by consensus. It is clear that the intent was for the Joint Commission to resolve concerns about nonperformance by consensus. That is not what E3 wants; but Iran can be expected to call for the Joint Commission to ‘resolve by consensus’, and that China and Russia will support Iran. And that will take time. How much?
From 3.1, a meeting of the Joint Commission is to commence within 3 days. How long the Joint Commission will deliberate is specified in Paragraph 36 of the JCPOA main body, Dispute Resolution Mechanism: “the Joint Commission would have 15 days to resolve the issue, unless the time period was extended by consensus.” So, the minimum time for step 1 would be 3 + 15 = 18 days.
And that is just the start. JCPOA paragraph 36 specifies the following steps in the Dispute Resolution Mechanism:
Joint Commission decision referred to Ministers of Foreign Affairs (15 or more days);
Iran requests consideration by Advisory Board (15 days);
Back to Joint Commission for another meeting and decision (3 + 5 days);
If Joint Commission reaches a decision, E3 would notify the UN Security Council.
Those steps easily add up to at least two months to get to the UN Security Council. And how long would the Security Council take to deal with this issue? Perhaps it would be a repeat of the Pompeo fiasco: U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo brought ‘snapback’ to the UNSC during Trump 1 and was told in polite diplomatic language to go home and read the documents. That could happen again, taking only one day. Or it could drag out until Russia takes over for its month as Chair of the Security Council.
And then there is the question of whose ‘nonperformance’ of JCPOA obligations? Today, nobody is or has met its obligations. But that started way back in 2015 when E3 began to fail to come through with the economic goodies it had promised Iran. And that became more evident in the year after Trump pulled out of JCPOA in 2018 when Iran waited for E3 to come through and it did not. So, after the one year wait, Iran began to stop implementing its JCPOA obligations, in accordance with the relevant JCPOA provision. Iran did that in phases, continuing to give E3 the opportunity to make things right, but they never have. Bottom line, Iran’s nonperformance came as a result of E3 (and U.S.) nonperformance. That’s what Russia and Iran mean by the E3 have “no right to invoke the "snap back" of sanctions.”
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