Tehran, Iran – After about a decade, Iran is once more subject to United Nations sanctions as the West piles pressure on Tehran, despite opposition from Russia and China.
The sanctions were automatically reinstated at midnight GMT on Sunday after the European signatories of Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal invoked the “snapback” mechanism of the landmark accord to reactivate them.
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They include an arms embargo, asset freezes and travel bans, and nuclear, missile and banking sanctions that are expected to impact all sectors of the beleaguered Iranian economy, as most of over 90 million people pay the price over the coming months.
The sanctions are binding for all member states, to be enforced using nonmilitary measures.
Iran’s turbulent regional situation has some fearing more military strikes by Israel and the United States, who perpetrated 12 days of attacks on the country in June that killed more than 1,000 people and caused billions of dollars in damage.
Iranians are concerned that Israel would use them as an excuse to attack again, as it used the resolution issued by the global nuclear watchdog in June as a pretext for a war that was cheered by Israeli officials and the public alike.
Nervous markets, worried people
On Sunday, market reactions showed economic anxiety over Iran’s increasing isolation due to the sanctions.
The Iranian rial traded at more than 1.3 million per US dollar in Tehran’s open currency market on the second day of the working week, but activity was limited amid fluctuations.
This marked an all-time low for the rial, which has dropped from 1.06 million per dollar when European powers triggered the snapback process a month ago.
“Things are not looking stable at all,” said Rouzbeh, a 35-year-old who works at the Grand Bazaar of Tehran, selling electric motors imported from China and other countries.
“Just like with the past few years, when the dollar has been going up, imported goods will get more expensive and scarce,” he told Al Jazeera.
“Some people here close off all sales for a few days until there’s some price stability. Others take advantage of the situation and hike prices. When prices go up, sales go down because people’s purchasing power is not going up.”
Hardliners in Tehran seemed happy with the renewed UN sanctions, likely because it means the demise of a nuclear accord that they vehemently opposed for a decade as allegedly amounting to “pure loss”.
Saeed Jalili, ultraconservative member of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and longtime failed presidential candidate, posted online a video of a speech made last week to condemn the nuclear deal and engagement with the West.
“Today we must neutralise the enemy’s excessive demands and prevent his further threats,” he said, without elaborating how.
Iranian newspapers reflected people’s concerns, with reformist Shargh daily mourning the “death” of the nuclear deal and Donya-e-Eqtesad, the country’s largest economic daily, pointing out that inflation is at its highest point in 28 months at more than 40 percent.
Kayhan, whose editor-in-chief is appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, tried to downplay the situation, claiming that “economic growth was positive without negotiations, negative with negotiations”.
Khamenei last week ruled out any talks with the US.
Who abused the snapback mechanism?
The snapback process was part of the nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), set up to punish Iran if it reneged on strict limits set to ensure the peacefulness of its nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.
Iran, China and Russia argue that the West has abused the mechanism – set to expire on October 18 – since it was US President Donald Trump who withdrew from JCPOA in 2018 and imposed unilateral sanctions while Iran remained committed.
Tehran started gradually abandoning the curbs only a year after that, but maintains that it will never seek a bomb.
After numerous tit-for-tat measures over the years, Iran’s enrichment of uranium was up to 60 percent – but it had not attempted to build a bomb – as claimed by Israel and the US in their pretext for the attack.
The fate of its high-enriched uranium and the exact damage to its underground nuclear facilities remain unclear since the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was denied access to most sites after the war.
Trying to avert the crisis
Perceiving Iran to be at its weakest in decades and fuming over its alleged supply of explosive drones to Russia for the Ukraine war, the US and its three European allies – France, Germany and the United Kingdom, also known as the E3 – have applied pressure while rejecting Iranian proposals for an interim understanding.
Repeated calls and a last-ditch UN Security Council vote put forward by China and Russia on Friday to defer snapback were rejected as well.
While Israel was attacking Iran in June, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz went as far as saying Israel was “doing the dirty work” for the West by attacking Iran.
Araghchi, whom the West accused at one point of not being an authoritative representative of Iran, said on Sunday that the West “buried” diplomacy and chose bullying.
“Terminated sanctions cannot be revived,” he insisted on X, adding that Iran considers the UNSC resolution underpinning the nuclear deal as expiring in October, as previously planned.
China and Russia appeared to be on the same page, the three countries stressing last month that the move lacked a legal basis.
Moscow delivered strong rhetoric on Friday, telling the UNSC meeting in New York that any attempts to resuscitate the sanctions are “null and void”, even threatening that it will “seriously reconsider our relations” with the UN Secretariat.
On Thursday, Russia and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding worth $25bn to build several nuclear power reactors in Iran.
China has remained the largest buyer of Iranian oil over the years despite US sanctions, enjoying hefty discounts from an isolated Iran.
It remains to be seen whether the two world powers, or any other of Iran’s limited allies, will risk exposing themselves to secondary UN sanctions by significantly dealing with Iran.
‘US policy, delegated to Israel’
Ali Akbar Dareini, a researcher for the Tehran-based Center for Strategic Studies, said the Europeans and the US “showed utmost animosity” and “slaughtered” the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
“The US has delegated its Iran policy to Israel since Trump has taken office,” he told Al Jazeera.
“The US in the past refused to be drawn into a war with Iran, but Christian evangelists and Zionists, including the US ambassador to Israel, have been instrumental in convincing Trump to join the Israeli war of aggression against Iran,” Akbar Dareini said.
He said Iran will be working to circumvent sanctions as it has for years, but also has other options, like putting an end to IAEA monitoring of Iran’s nuclear facilities, leaving the NPT, or stopping implementation of all NPT commitments without formally withdrawing.
“America’s top priority is to focus on and contain China. Before doing that, the US needs to bring the Middle East into a new regional order with Israel at the top. The big obstacle is Iran, so they are trying to weaken and destabilise Iran to achieve their goal.”
