The administration of the new US president, Joe Biden, is squaring up to challenges from home and abroad – with Iran and Afghanistan requiring the most foreign policy attention. It is now clear that the US wants to salvage the Iran nuclear deal following Trump’s unilateral withdrawal in 2018.
Saving the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) would likely be approved by three of the five participants – Germany, France and the UK – while the other two, China and Russia, would be unlikely to object. There may be opposition in the US to saving the deal, but it’s Iran’s attitude that really counts.
This is especially pertinent as Iran’s relatively moderate president, Hassan Rouhani, wants an agreement against the wishes of the hardline IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) and conservative religious leaders. This would be difficult to achieve in the best of times, but particularly since a presidential election looms in June, which Rouhani cannot stand in. The deal must either be cemented before then, or the future of the whole JCPOA apparatus will be delayed until after the election.
Read the complete article at: Open Democracy