PARIS — Britain, France, and Germany have told the United Nations they are ready to reimpose UN-mandated sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program if no diplomatic solution is found by the end of August, according to a joint letter obtained by AFP.
The letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the UN Security Council said the three European powers are “committed to use all diplomatic tools at our disposal to ensure Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon” unless Tehran meets the deadline.
The foreign ministers from the so-called E3 group threatened to use a “snapback mechanism” that was part of a 2015 international deal with Iran that eased UN Security Council sanctions.
Under the deal, which terminates in October, any party to the accord can restore the sanctions.
All three have stepped up warnings to Iran, which is sworn to the destruction of Israel, about its suspension of cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.
That came after Israel launched a 12-day war with Iran in June, seeking to destroy its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities. The United States staged its own bombing raid during the war, targeting key Iranian underground nuclear sites.
“We have made clear that if Iran is not willing to reach a diplomatic solution before the end of August 2025, or does not seize the opportunity of an extension, E3 are prepared to trigger the snapback mechanism,” foreign ministers Jean-Noel Barrot of France, David Lammy of Britain, and Johann Wadephul of Germany said in the letter.
All three countries were signatories to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with the United States, China, and Russia that offered the carrot and stick deal for Iran to slow its enrichment of uranium needed for a nuclear weapon.
US President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the accord in 2018 during his first term and ordered new sanctions at the urgings of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Iran then began enriching uraniaum far beyond the limitations of the agreement.
The European countries’ letter set out engagements that the ministers said Iran has breached, including building up a uranium stock more than 40 times the permitted level under the 2015 deal.
“The E3 remain fully committed to a diplomatic resolution to the crisis caused by Iran’s nuclear program and will continue to engage with a view to reaching a negotiated solution,” they said.
“We are equally ready, and have unambiguous legal grounds, to notify the significant non-performance of JCPOA commitments by Iran… thereby triggering the snapback mechanism, should no satisfactory solution be reached by the end of August 2025,” the ministers wrote in the letter first reported by the Financial Times.
In response, Iranian lawmaker Manouchehr Mottaki told Defapress on Wednesday that Iran’s parliament was ready to withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) should the sanctions be reimposed.
The United States under the new Trump administration had previously attempted talks with Iran, which denies seeking a weapon, over its nuclear activities. But these were halted when Israel carried out its strikes in June on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Even before the strikes, the international powers had raised concerns about the lack of access given to IAEA inspectors, in addition to Iran’s enrichment of uranium to levels that have no civilian use.
Iran halted all cooperation with the IAEA after the strikes, but it announced that the agency’s deputy chief was expected in Tehran for talks on a new cooperation deal.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi sent a letter to the UN last month saying that the European countries did not have the legal right to restore sanctions.
The European ministers called this allegation “unfounded.”
They insisted that as JCPOA signatories, they would be “clearly and unambiguously legally justified in using relevant provisions” of UN resolutions “to trigger UN snapback to reinstate UNSC resolutions against Iran which would prohibit enrichment and re-impose UN sanctions.”