As US nears Iran peace deal, a look at the 2015 nuclear pact abandoned by Trump

WASHINGTON, June 14 — The US says it is close to signing a peace deal that would end the ‌three-month-old war with Iran, though terms have not yet been made public. It is not clear at this point how any agreement would stack up against the 2015 deal with ‌Iran, which lifted sanctions in exchange for restrictions on its nuclear activities. The agreement, signed by Iran, the US, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany, aimed to extend the time Iran would need to produce a nuclear bomb from two to three months to a year. Tehran says it has never had a nuclear weapons programme. Trump pulled the US out of the deal in 2018 during his first term in office and re-imposed sanctions. Iran began breaching its terms in 2019, and United Nations sanctions were reimposed in 2025. The deal is ‌now effectively dead.

Below are the main elements of the 2015 deal, known ⁠as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Sanctions ⁠relief

The US, European Union and United Nations lifted ⁠sanctions that targeted Iran’s oil, gas, ⁠petrochemical, banking, shipping and ⁠auto sectors, as well as its trade in gold and minerals. The EU and US also removed the Central Bank of Iran and other entities and people ⁠from sanctions lists. The US allowed sales of commercial aircraft and imports of Iranian carpets and food.

Uranium enrichment

Iran agreed to cap enrichment at 3.67 per cent purity for 15 years, far below the 90 per cent purity needed to produce a weapon. That is also below the 20 per cent level Iran had produced before the deal. Iran ⁠also agreed to cap its enriched uranium stockpile at 300 kilograms, down from the much larger amounts it had previously produced, and reduce the ⁠number of centrifuges from 19,000 to 6,100. Excess material was downblended to the level ⁠of natural uranium ⁠or shipped out of the country. That reduced Iran’s stockpile by 98 per cent, according to the United States.

The underground Fordow enrichment facility was to be converted into a research centre.

Plutonium ‌production

Iran agreed to redesign its heavy-water reactor at Arak so it could not produce weapons-grade plutonium.

Monitoring

The International Atomic Energy Agency was given wide-ranging inspection powers. — Reuters