Russian Deputy Foreign Minister: Fourth JCPOA Step by Iran Inevitable'

"They announced a long time ago that if there is no progress from the side of other parties to the JCPOA in ensuring Iran’s legal economic interests, they will take the corresponding measures every two months,” Sergei Ryabkov told TASS on Friday.

“I assume that if the situation continues to stall and if there is no improvement regarding Iran’s trade-economic situation, the so-called fourth stage may become inevitable," he noted.

Ryabkov added that this issue was not discussed during the talks with Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Seyyed Abbas Araghchi held in Moscow on Thursday.

"We have not discussed this specifically, we talked about what needs to be done to improve the stability of JCPOA," Ryabkov said.

In 2015, Iran and six major powers (five member states of the United Nations Security Council — Russia, the United States, France, the United Kingdom and China — and Germany) agreed on the final Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which particularly stipulated the removal of sanctions imposed on Tehran over its nuclear program.

On May 8, 2018, US President Donald Trump announced Washington’s unilateral withdrawal from the nuclear deal. Washington imposed previous sanctions on Iran and introduced new ones.

In response to the US move to leave the JCPOA and reimpose sanctions, Tehran has so far rowed back on its nuclear commitments three times in compliance with articles 26 and 36 of the JCPOA, but stressed that its retaliatory measures will be reversible as soon as European signatories to the accord find practical ways to shield the mutual trade from the US sanctions.

Iran says that if it does not receive economic benefits from the JCPOA by November it will further reduce its commitments.