Iran Urges UNSC to Show Its Independence on Arms Embargo Vote

A senior Iranian official has called on members of the UN Security Council to show their independence by voting against a US-drafted resolution on the extension of a UN arms embargo against Iran, which is to expire in October.

In a tweet on Monday, the Iranian president’s chief of staff Mahmoud Vaezi said the upcoming session of the UN Security Council to vote on the US-drafted resolution is a “big test” for the Council’s member states.

“The member states of the Security Council are on the verge of a big test to show their independence by giving a negative vote to the US regime’s pressures, which are aimed at imposing its will against Iran, violating the UN Security Council Resolution 2231 and leading the 2015 nuclear deal (JCPOA) to collapse,” he said.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday that the United Nations Security Council will vote this week on a US bid to extend the arms embargo on Iran, despite warnings by some diplomats that the measure lacks support.

“We have an objective to extend the arms embargo,” Brian Hook, special envoy for Iran, told reporters in a press call Thursday morning. “That can be done the easy way or it can be done the hard way, but it’s going to be extended.”

If the United States is unsuccessful in extending the embargo, it has threatened to trigger a return of all UN sanctions on Iran under a process agreed in the 2015 deal.

The US has been lobbying for months to get an extension of the Iran arms embargo, which expires in October as one of the conditions of the 2015 Obama-era Iran nuclear deal- formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

But this week’s Security Council resolution is likely to fail. Even if the US is able to drum up the nine votes for it to pass the chamber, it would likely face a veto from China and Russia.
In May, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani threatened a “crushing response” if the embargo on Iranian trade of conventional arms was extended.

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