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Iran, China, Russia sign joint letter reaffirming illegality of E3's snapback move

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

Sep 1, 2025

Tehran, IRNA -- Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi says Iran along with Russia and China have reaffirmed that the move by E3 countries, namely Britain, France, and Germany, to trigger the "snapback mechanism" against the Islamic Republic is void and without any legal basis.

The Iranian foreign minister shared a post on his X account on Monday, saying that he and his Chinese and Russian counterparts, Wang Yi and Sergey Lavrov, signed a joint letter in Tianjin, China, where they attended the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit.

"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," Araghchi said in his post.

The joint letter by the foreign ministers of Iran, Russia, and China comes after the E3, all members of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), informed the United Nations Security Council on Thursday that they had triggered the "snapback" mechanism that would restore UN sanctions lifted under the JCPOA, citing what they called non-compliance by Iran.

The United States withdrew from the JCPOA in 2018 during the first term of President Donald Trump. Iran began reciprocal measures a year later, after the European parties to the deal failed to compensate for the US pullout.

"By declaring the E3's move null and void, we have placed on record that no party can erase the sequence of events: it was the United States that first violated the JCPOA and Resolution 2231, and it was Europe that subsequently chose to align with unlawful sanctions instead of honoring its own commitments. These undeniable facts must frame any serious discussion at the Security Council," said Araghchi.

Highlighting international regulations regarding the rights of countries, he underlined, "We have also reaffirmed a fundamental principle of international law: rights and obligations cannot be separated. States that fail to fulfill their own commitments cannot claim the benefits of an agreement they have undermined. The credibility of multilateral diplomacy depends on this logic. What is at stake is not only Iran's rights but the integrity of international agreements themselves. If selective compliance and procedural abuse are tolerated, the very foundation of collective security will be fatally weakened."

The Iranian minister went on to say, "The primary function of the Security Council is to act on behalf of the international community to maintain peace and security. What the E3 proposes betrays this mission, turning the Council into an instrument of coercion rather than a guardian of global stability. The urgent task before us is to restore international law and build upon it to give diplomacy the ground it needs to succeed."

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