MOSCOW, January 31. /TASS/. Moscow is concerned about the tensions around Iran and considers the West's course to scrap the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) for the Iranian nuclear program a mistake, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a news conference following talks with his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shoukry on Tuesday.

"Yes, we are concerned about this. We believe that it is a huge mistake by the West, primarily by the participants in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action for the Iranian nuclear program. They have openly taken a course towards scrapping this important document, which was unanimously approved by the UN Security Council," he said.

Lavrov drew attention to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s statement that Washington was considering, among other things, military means of preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

"These actions by the West mean only one thing: they prefer to defy the UN Security Council’s resolutions and opt for aggressive actions, including the use of military force, instead of implementing the decisions of the highest UN body," Lavrov said.

"If they want to make this their main aim, they don’t have to knock on an open door. The Iranian religious leadership has long issued a fatwa prohibiting the development of nuclear weapons. If anyone still has doubts about this, the JCPOA provides for the most stringent and strict verification procedure in relation to Iran's nuclear program as compared to the rules that exist in relation to any other country," Lavrov added.

The JCPOA was signed with Tehran in 2015 by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany in order to address the crisis over Iran’s nuclear research. In 2018, the former president of the United States, Donald Trump, pulled out of this agreement. The current US leader, Joe Biden, has repeatedly signaled his willingness to bring Washington back into the nuclear deal.

Since April 2021, Russia, Britain, Germany, China, the United States and France have been in talks with Iran in Vienna on breathing new life into the JCPOA. On November 10, 2022, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rafael Grossi said that negotiations with Iranian representatives in the Austrian capital ended inconclusively.