The European Union proposed easing sanctions on Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) in order to revive the Iranian nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Politico reported on Friday.
The proposal, brokered by EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell in coordination with US officials, is not seeking the suspension of sanctions against the IRGC but may “significantly limit their effectiveness,” the news outlet said.
“Non-US persons doing business with Iranian persons that are not on the [US sanctions list] will not be exposed to sanctions merely as a result of those Iranian persons engaging in separate transactions involving Iranian persons on the [US sanctions list] (including the IRGC, its officials, or its subsidiaries or affiliates),” the proposal says, as quoted by Politico.
If the draft resolution is adopted, it would allow companies in the European Union to do business in Iran, evading US and EU sanctions.
The details of the draft were finalized in Vienna, Austria, after 16 months of talks. In light of close EU-US coordination, the terms of the draft suggest that the United States under the Biden administration is prepared to make greater concessions to secure a deal with Tehran.
Following the publication of the Politico report, US special envoy to the Vienna talks, Rob Malley, told the outlet that the United States was not changing its standards or rules in terms of sanction enforcement.
“To be clear: We have not engaged in any negotiation about changing due diligence, know-your-customer, or other US sanctions compliance standards for sanctions that would remain under a mutual return to full [nuclear deal] implementation. Any report to the contrary is flat out wrong,” Malley said, while also tweeting a similar comment.
President Biden dismissed in April a demand from Iran for him to reverse a decision taken by the Trump administration in 2019 to label the IRGC a “terrorist organization”. A group of US senators in May signed a resolution declaring that the US should not agree to any deal that would entail the lifting of sanctions on Iran.
Source: Iranian media (edited by Al-Manar English Website)
