Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on September 1, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 22, 2026
China and Russia reject European sanctions on Iran, citing legal flaws in the snapback mechanism. Iran's uranium production exceeds limits set by the 2015 nuclear deal.
DUBAI (Reuters) -UN Security Council permanent members China and Russia backed Iran on Monday in rejecting a move by European countries to reimpose UN sanctions on Tehran loosened a decade ago under a nuclear agreement.
A letter signed by the Chinese, Russian and Iranian foreign ministers said a move by Britain, France and Germany to automatically restore the sanctions under a so-called "snapback mechanism" was "legally and procedurally flawed".
China and Russia were signatories to Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, along with the three European countries, known as the E3. U.S. President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the agreement in his first term in 2018.
The Europeans launched the "snapback mechanism" last week, accusing Iran of violating the deal, which had provided relief from international financial sanctions in return for curbs to Iran's nuclear programme.
The letter published by Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi in a post on X on Monday said that the course taken by Britain, France, and Germany "abuses the authority and functions of the UN Security Council".
Iran has long since broken through the limits on uranium production set under the 2015 deal, arguing that it is justified in doing so as a consequence of Washington having pulled out of the agreement. The deal expires in October this year, and the snapback mechanism would allow sanctions that were lifted under it to take effect again.
Iran and the E3 held talks aimed at a new nuclear agreement after Israel and the U.S. bombed Iran's nuclear installations in mid-June. But the E3 deemed that talks in Geneva last week did not yield sufficient signals of readiness for a new deal from Iran.
"Our joint letter with my colleagues, the foreign ministers of China and Russia, signed in Tianjin, reflects the firm position that the European attempt to invoke snapback is legally baseless and politically destructive", Iran's foreign minister said in his post on X.
(Reporting by Jana Choukeir and Elwely ElwellyEditing by Hugh Lawson and Peter Graff)
China and Russia have joined Iran in rejecting the European countries' move to reimpose UN sanctions on Tehran.
The snapback mechanism is a process that allows for the automatic restoration of sanctions if a country is deemed to be violating the terms of an agreement, which the E3 countries are trying to invoke against Iran.
The talks aimed at a new nuclear agreement did not yield successful results, as deemed by the E3 following discussions in Geneva.
Iran argues that it is justified in exceeding the uranium production limits set under the 2015 nuclear deal due to the United States' withdrawal from the agreement.
They stated that the European attempt to invoke the snapback mechanism is legally baseless and politically motivated.
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