What I Learned Last Week: SALSA & SNSC

It’s been a restless few years on the geopolitical dance floor for those working on Iranian matters.   

Even after the JCPOA came into effect on 16 January, 2016, we counted down the days between periodic IAEA assessments of Iran’s compliance with the terms of the nuclear accord and the follow-on certification by the U.S. President to Congress that Iran remained within the bounds of its obligations. 

Following President Trump’s election in 2017, what had once been a routinized test of Iranian adherence assumed an erratic tempo more suggestive of musical chairs: for how long would the President continue to issue that requisite certification?  We held our breath around the time of the review and recertification every 90 days and made ourselves and our clients ready if the music were to stop. 

As did Iran, which remained in compliance with the deal and expected the other signatories to do the same. 

But in the last months of 2017 and particularly in the first quarter of 2018, we all began sense that time was close to up, two-stepping between wished-for continuity and readiness for an eventual rush for exit seats as we drafted impossibility clauses and tightened termination, arbitration, and force majeure provisions.  

Thus, from May 2018 until the first phase of snapback in August, we were still in a waltz, syncopated but smooth, with an orderly measure thanks to the hopes pinned on the European Blocking Statute.  

Thereafter, though, as the second phase of snapback was ushered in, it suddenly felt as if the music had stopped. Foreign offices were shuttered, suspension or termination notices were issued, and President Rouhani’s “hope” administration turned into one of despair in the anxious eyes of the broader public. 

The following year, Iran took the initiative and began to play its own tune, talking up its options in response to Europe’s failure to uphold the JCPOA and citing its economic grievances suffered. 

Eventually, on the one year anniversary of America’s withdrawal, Iran’s “strategic patience” was declared officially finished, replaced by a calculated reduction of nuclear compliance and new commitments to increasing enrichment levels 60 days thereafter unless the non-American JCPOA signatories found suitable solutions.   

And as of today, we are once more trying to keep in step with the newest variation on that theme: SALSA. 

Iran’s Parliament has just passed the Strategic Action for Lifting of Sanctions Act (“SALSA”), which stipulates that, should JCPOA signatories (most critically America) not return to full compliance within 60 days, Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization must ramp up its nuclear activities, increasing uranium enrichment output by 500kg monthly, restarting the heavy water Arak reactor, and most significant, stockpiling high purity (20%) enriched uranium, over five times the 3.67% limit required under the JCPOA.  

SALSA effectively urges President Rouhani’s administration to find an expedited solution to the normalization of transactional, trade and regulatory barriers put in place by American sanctions.  In particular, the government is compelled to restore Iran’s international banking ties, to lift all legal barriers to the sale and export of oil and petrochemicals, and to procure the repatriation of foreign currency, or else face consequences.    

While the demands sound formidable, SALSA represents a firm nudge from Parliament to the Rouhani government and even more so a call to the international community to deal with a problem, which, while expected to be tackled by the Biden administration, may not otherwise have been addressed with immediate priority.  

SALSA also appears to suggest that the tone out of Tehran may be tending towards expedient dynamism rather than the “strategic patience” of yore: the sense of deadlines and ultimatums, particularly concerning sensitive thresholds of fissile material, is by design, and Iran knows SALSA is going to get feet moving. 

SALSA may therefore be thought of as upping the tempo rather than signaling a precipitous, dramatic denouement to the drawn-out JCPOA cotillion. 

But who is keeping the beat here? 

Parliament overwhelmingly voted in favor of SALSA, which then went for ratification by the Guardian Council, Iran’s legal interpretative body. Following the Guardian Council’s confirmation, the speaker of Parliament (Mr. Mohammed Qalibaf, former Tehran mayor and reputed presidential contender) has duly notified President Rouhani to proceed with its publication in Iran’s official legal gazette, formally rendering the law enforceable. 

But on the other hand, as Mr. Qalibaf has made clear in a concurrent interview, after legislative approval, Parliament must not interfere with the execution of the laws, while Iran’s Foreign Minister Zarif has hinted that Iran needn’t give teeth to the key provisions of SALSA - if only America and the rest of the P5+1 do what they ought.  

After all (per Iran), is it so much to ask for the restoration of international banking relationships and the flow of petroleum products proceeds? Surely that’s not a lot, Dr. Zarif has said, especially during a global pandemic where the need for hard currency is demonstrable.

Under Iran’s Constitution, though, when it comes to nuclear matters, it is neither Parliament nor the Presidency but the Supreme National Security Council (“SNSC”) which technically formulates atomic energy policy. The SNSC by dint of Article 176 of the Constitution is under the aegis of the President, who selects the secretary of the SNSC, but the council’s actual decisions are subject to final approval by Iran’s Supreme Leader.  

It remains to be seen if the posturing by Parliament is substantiated by the SNSC. And time will tell whether SALSA produces its intended results or ends up as a melodramatic feint by Parliament, but as things stand now, the music will be playing for at least another 60 days.