ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The United States is ending waivers that have allowed several Russian, European, and Chinese companies to continue working at Iranian nuclear facilities under the 2015 nuclear deal, the State Department announced Wednesday. While the Trump administration withdrew from the deal in 2018, Washington has allowed for the continuation of select provisions of the agreement, regularly extending waivers for several projects. The soon-to-be defunct waivers have allowed select companies to work at approved nuclear facilities without being targeted with sanctions associated with the US “maximum pressure” campaign. The waivers have allowed for several projects originating from the nuclear deal, namely the modification of the Arak reactor to prevent its ability to create nuclear weapons, the provision of enriched uranium by Russia for Tehran’s Research Reactor, as well as the export of the country’s spent and scrap reactor fuel. Companies involved in the projects now have 60 days to disengage without facing American penalties. The Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant Unit 1 is the only civil nuclear cooperation project with international support to be spared by the US in Wednesday’s announcement, maintaining a waiver extension of 90 days. Since the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal, Washington has imposed crippling sanctions on the Iranian economy, targeting senior officials in the Iranian government and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The US placed sanctions on Iranian nuclear officials Wednesday, including Amjad Sazgar and Majid Agha’i, both involved in a managerial role at Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization. Washington says that Iran is involved in maligned activities across the region and its nuclear programme is geared toward developing weapons. “The regime’s nuclear extortion will lead to increased pressure on Iran and further isolate the regime from the international community,” said US Secretary of State in the statement announcing the end of waivers. The landmark 2015 nuclear deal was signed between Iran and the P5 + 1 (permanent security council members - the US, Russia, France, UK, China - plus Germany). The deal was designed to curb Tehran’s nuclear ambitions in return for sanctions relief. However, the deal began to unravel in May 2018 when US President Donald Trump pulled his country out of the deal unilaterally, arguing the agreement did not guarantee Iran would not obtain nuclear weapons and that Iran was destabilizing the Middle East through armed proxy groups across the region. Trump has said more than once that the deal needs to be renegotiated to include Iran’s ballistic missiles program and regional behavior. The global financial dominance of the US dollar has meant the deal’s European, Russian and Chinese signatories have been able to do little to alleviate pressure on Iran’s economy from Washington’s crushing sanctions. In response, Iran has begun a gradual abandonment of its commitments to the nuclear deal - moves that Iran has argued are reversible if sanctions relief is provided. Tehran announced in January that it would no longer comply with restrictions on nuclear enrichment, the latest move in undermining the landmark deal. Tensions between Tehran and Washington have spiked following the US drone strike in Iraq that killed Iranian general Qasem Soleimani and Iran’s retaliatory fire of ballistic missiles at US bases in January. Iran has been hit by the deadliest coronavirus outbreak in the Middle East, with more than 7,500 dead and nearly 140,000 infected. The country hosted the first legislative session Wednesday for the new parliament. While elected in February, the body has been closed for six weeks in measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
