Is the JCPOA Legal or Political?

In the U.S. and Iran, the nature of the nuclear agreement between six major world powers and Tehran has sparked extensive political and legal debates. Some insist on the legal nature of the agreement, abbreviated as 'JCPOA,' as a contract with legal weight and consequences, while many international law experts, relying on the text and framework of the 150-page agreement, consider it a political agreement whose implementation or non-implementation will have political rather than legal consequences. Over the past two months, numerous conferences and meetings have been held in academic circles in Tehran and Washington to clarify this issue, and discussions continue. In both camps, opponents and supporters of the legal nature of the nuclear agreement, which the U.S. President has labeled a historic agreement, have actively participated, including lawyers, politicians, lawmakers, and even media analysts; however, outside of these discussions and debates, governments emphasize the non-legal nature of the agreement. In the United States, the President, Secretary of State, and National Security Advisor have repeatedly stated that this agreement does not create any obligations for the U.S. government and is merely an agreement in which one party is the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and ultimately the United Nations, and the other party is the Iranian government. In Iran, in addition to President Hassan Rouhani, several members of his cabinet have also deemed the involvement of the Islamic Consultative Assembly unnecessary based on similar reasoning, although Ayatollah Khamenei has called for parliamentary oversight. In any case, alongside the important points of the nuclear agreement, its political nature prevails over its legal nature. Saeed Mahmoudi, a professor of international law at Stockholm University in Sweden, explains two main reasons for this: the JCPOA is certainly not a legal treaty but a political agreement, and insisting on considering it a legal document has political motivations rather than legal justifications. Mr. Mahmoudi states: 'A legal document usually exists between two parties, and if one of the parties violates it, that action has legal consequences and under international law, they are responsible and obliged to compensate the other parties of that contract or legal treaty. Usually, it is possible to bring the matter before an international court, and therefore its consequences are limited to that extent. The JCPOA will not have any of these consequences. The reason is that explicitly, in three places in this lengthy document, Iran's position is particularly mentioned, and this is unprecedented that if the opposing parties do not fulfill their commitments, Iran will revert to its previous operations. This means that if Iran violates this agreement, the other party will also revert to the previous state; that is, the return of sanctions and starting over.' Mr. Mahmoudi adds: 'Another major reason why this international document is not legal is that usually, the parties to a document have the legal capacity to create an obligation; that is, Iran has a series of rights and duties reflected in this document, and the opposing party does as well. However, in this [nuclear agreement] document, the issue is that one party is Iran, which is accused of a series of violations and has legal issues with the IAEA due to these violations. In other words, the Iranian side is the Agency and the Security Council [of the United Nations]. The member countries of the 1+5 group are not Iran's party and have not participated as Iran's party in this document [JCPOA]; rather, they entered negotiations as a third party seeking to resolve this issue peacefully. Therefore, the 1+5 have neither the authority nor can they compel the Agency or the Security Council to do anything.' However, Bahman Aghaei Diba, an international law expert in Virginia, USA, considers the nuclear agreement between Iran and the six major world powers a legal document made possible by political will. He states: 'In my opinion, there has been a political will between the two parties regarding mainly Iran's nuclear program, how to control this program, and how to lift the sanctions imposed against Iran; each of these requires passing through their specific legal stages to reach the implementation phase. Therefore, this issue has occurred due to the existence of a political will from both sides, but currently, it has a strong legal aspect, and if the parties fail to fulfill their obligations, it will enter lengthy legal phases in the future.' Regardless of the legal nature of the nuclear agreement, what concerns public opinion in Iran, the U.S., and the Middle East region are the potential consequences of non-implementation of the JCPOA, even in the current situation where the risk of the JCPOA becoming ineffective in the U.S. Congress has been alleviated. Mr. Mahmoudi, a professor of international law at Stockholm University, believes that for any reason, if the JCPOA agreement is not implemented, nothing will happen except a return to the pre-JCPOA conditions: 'This document is certainly not an international treaty; it is a political document, and if Iran or the opposing party violates it, nothing will happen except that we return to the situation before the JCPOA; that is, Iran will restart all its previous activities, and the opposing party will impose all sanctions and perhaps even more sanctions against Iran.' Bahman Aghaei Diba also believes that non-implementation of the JCPOA will not immediately lead to the outbreak of war between Iran and the major powers, especially the U.S. 'There is no doubt that if Iran fails to fulfill its obligations, for example, reducing the number of centrifuges, re-planning the Arak [heavy water] reactor, if these do not start and are not implemented, the issue will be raised at the International Atomic Energy Agency, and if the Agency issues a resolution and accuses Iran of non-fulfillment of its obligations, the issue will go to the United Nations Security Council, where new decisions regarding the handling of this issue, including the return of sanctions or even the intensification of sanctions, may be made.' But what could be the most acute scenario in the event of non-implementation of the JCPOA? Bahman Aghaei Diba: 'Of course, a lot of talk is made about the fact that if this agreement fails, the next stage is war. But I think that there will be many different states between the failure of these agreements and the onset of war, and it is not the case that assuming the rejection of this issue in the U.S. Congress or even the rejection of the President's opinion and his veto in Congress will immediately lead to a state of war between Iran and these countries.' Mr. Mahmoudi in Stockholm also believes that all parties are determined to resolve Iran's nuclear issue diplomatically. He states: 'Both Iran and the opposing party are politically determined to solve this issue. Both sides will try their best. Both sides are under serious internal pressure, so they are compelled to do everything politically possible to ensure this political agreement reaches a conclusion and resolves Iran's legal issue with the Agency and the Security Council [of the United Nations].' However, among U.S. policymakers and even to some extent in Europe, the main issue is the lack of trust and confidence in the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In the U.S. Congress, even lawmakers who firmly support the President's policy have suspicions about the Iranian government as strong as those of the opponents of Mr. Obama. In Europe, there are individuals like Lord Maginnis from the House of Lords in Britain who have similar suspicions. Lord Maginnis recently wrote in the Huffington Post: 'Amid the conflicting debates over the JCPOA, both opposing and supporting sides must consider the historical context of the Iranian regime's relations.'