Ex-Iran envoy to London warns end of JCPOA jeopardizes peace

In an Op-Ed run by Etemad Online, an Iranian news outlet, Mohsen Baharvand said once the JCPOA is pronounced dead, the parties to the agreement will take actions that could jeopardize regional and international peace.

Baharvand said the nuclear deal is not an ordinary agreement whose revocation would only have legal and political ramifications.

Baharvand also said Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s administration initially thought of the JCPOA as “something absolutely harmful” but later concluded that it would be able to change the agreement adding some new points thereto.

He added that Raisi thought that such changes must not be at odds with his criticism of the JCPOA and that embracing the deal must not be such that would draw criticism from his traditional supporters and chip away at his support base.

“Thus”, Baharvand noted, “our negotiators added the adjective ‘good’ to the deal and tried to show they were after a good deal.”

He noted that the adjective “good” is relative and the same word caused the addition of some points to the JCPOA and delayed its conclusion.

He also said the western parties to the talks over the revival of JCPOA should be warned that the path they have taken is not realistic.

According to the former Iranian diplomat, the psychological barriers to finalizing an agreement can be removed by a practical action on part of all parties to the JCPOA.