(Xinhua) — The international community must exhaust “all available diplomatic avenues” to restore the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran’s nuclear program, the UN political chief told the Security Council on Monday. Rosemary DiCarlo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, said that the hopefulness that accompanied the plan’s adoption eight years ago is now “quite diminished.”
“The participants are responsible for its fate,” she said, but whether the plan succeeds or fails matters to everyone in the world, especially at the current dangerous juncture in global security. Iran must reverse steps inconsistent with its nuclear-related commitments under the plan, while the United States needs to lift or waive its sanctions.
“The United Nations will continue to urge the participants to exercise maximum restraint and to exhaust all available diplomatic avenues to restore the Plan,” she added. She also provided an overview of actions relating to the restrictive measures set out as part of Council Resolution 2231 (2015), which endorsed the JCPOA.
DiCarlo said, “The secretary-general still considers that the JCPOA represents the best available option to ensure that the Iranian nuclear program remains exclusively peaceful.” Verification and monitoring of the JCPOA by the International Atomic Energy Agency has been “seriously affected by Iran’s cessation of its nuclear-related commitments under the JCPOA,” she said, citing the agency’s latest report.
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