Security chief: Iran’s main strategy is to render sanctions ineffective

Iran’s top security official says the country’s main strategy is to create mechanisms to neutralize the sanctions it is facing in parallel with efforts to secure a removal of the illegal restrictions.

Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani made the remarks on Wednesday morning at a special meeting with a group of lawmakers on the latest developments in the Vienna talks between Tehran and the other parties to the 2015 Iran deal.

The MPs were also informed of the progress made during the negotiations under the administration of President Ebrahim Raeisi, the existing challenges in Vienna, and the main priorities on the agenda of the Iranian delegation.

During the meeting, Shamkhani stressed the need for a quick resolution of the remaining outstanding issues, over which no consensus has been reached so far.

“The bitter experience of the US’s non-commitment and the European inaction has made it inevitable to meet the requirements for the conclusion of a credible, balanced and lasting agreement,” he added.

“In addition to efforts toward sanctions removal, the country’s major strategy is to focus on creating mechanisms in order to render the sanctions tool ineffective. Fortunately, very good measures have been taken in this regard,” Shamkhani said.

The lawmakers said Iran had managed to get through the crises caused by the oppressive sanctions targeting the economy and people’s livelihood.

They further urged the Iranian negotiating team to continue its endeavors to uphold the nation’s rights stipulated in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Washington left the JCPOA in 2018 and began to implement what it called the “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions against the Islamic Republic, depriving the country of the economic benefits of the agreement, including the removal of sanctions, for which Iran had agreed to certain caps on its nuclear activities.

In the meantime, the other parties to the deal, in particular France, Britain and Germany, only paid lip service to safeguarding Iran’s economic dividends as promised under the JCPOA, prompting Iran – after an entire year of “strategic patience” – to reduce its nuclear obligations in a legal move under the deal.

The talks began in the Austrian capital last April on the assumption that the US, under the Joe Biden administration, is willing to repeal the so-called maximum pressure policy pursued by former president Donald Trump.

Tehran says it won’t settle for anything less than the removal of all US sanctions in a verifiable manner. It also wants guarantees that Washington would not abandon the agreement again.