MOSCOW, January 17. /TASS/. Russia's state-run nuclear corporation Rosatom and Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization have cooperated in shipping out of Iran its entire stockpile of low-enriched uranium as it is envisaged in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) signed in Vienna on July 14, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.
"Russia has played a key role in creating conditions for the start of JCPOA," the ministry said. "Close cooperation between the Russian state corporation Rosatom and the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran has helped to carry out of the country all of Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium that was prescribed by the JCPOA and became the central and most painstaking condition [of the nuclear deal]."
Russia’s foreign ministry has said that on January 16 the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) published a report confirming that Iran had met "all the obligations required under the JCPOA" to enable its implementation.
"In line with this Plan approved by UN Security Council’s Resolution 2231 of July 20, 2015, the presentation of this report inaugurates a start of the JCPOA implementation," it said.
"On January 16, Resolutions 1696 (adopted in 2006), 1737 (in 2006), 1747 (in 2007), 1803 (in 2008), 1835 (in 2008), 1929 (in 2010) and 2224 (in 2015) approved by the United Nations Security Council over the Iran nuclear programme were lifted," the Russian foreign ministry said.
"Besides, in line with the resolution which the IAEA board of governors approved on December 15, 2015 all the previous resolutions on the Iran nuclear programme are terminated," the ministry said. "Thus, it has become a huge step towards the situation around Iran getting back to normal finally."
Iran and the P5+1 group of international mediators signed a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran’s nuclear program on July 14, 2015 in Vienna. Under the JCPOA, Iran undertakes to reduce the number of IR-1 first-generation centrifuges at the facility in Natanz from 19,000 to 6,100, of which only 5,060 will be used to enrich uranium in a period of ten years. Apart from that, Iran undertook not to manufacture weapons-grade plutonium, to have not more than 300 kilograms of 3.67% enriched uranium in a period of 15 years, to reshape nuclear facilities and use them exclusively in peaceful purposes. Enrichment activities will be allowed only at the facility in Natanz. The Fordow facility is to be reshaped to manufacture stable isotopes for industrial and medical uses. The heavy water reactor in Arak is to be overhauled to exclude weapons-grade plutonium production. All other centrifuges are to be dismantled and stored under control of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). In exchange, sanctions will be gradually removed from Iran. The arms embargo imposed by UN Security Council will be kept in place for five years, ban for supplying ballistic missile technologies to Iran - for eight years. Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will monitor nuclear facilities in Iran for the next 25 years. If any points of the agreement are violated by Iran, sanctions against the country will be renewed. On July 20, the corresponding resolution on Iran’s nuclear program agreement was adopted by the United Nations Security Council.