Russia, China block US push to maintain UN oversight of Iran sanctions

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - NEW YORK — Russia and China on Thursday vetoed a US-backed resolution at the United Nations that sought to keep a panel of experts monitoring sanctions imposed on Iran over its nuclear program, dealing a blow to international oversight efforts.

The United States had drafted the resolution to extend the UN expert panel's mandate for a year. It was defeated at the UN Security Council by a vote of 11-2, with Somalia and Pakistan abstaining.

The vote came after sanctions on Iran had been reimposed under the relevant international framework, prompting renewed discussions at the Security Council over how compliance should be monitored.

The UN Security Council sanctions were reimposed on 27 September last year under the snapback mechanism of the 2015 nuclear deal. They freeze Iranian assets abroad, restrict arms deals with Tehran and penalise the development of its ballistic missile program.

France, Germany and the United Kingdom triggered the snapback provision, which restored the Security Council sanctions committee and authorised the panel of experts to monitor compliance. Thursday's veto removes that oversight without lifting the underlying sanctions.

The vote comes as the Trump administration pursues a broader campaign to isolate Tehran economically. Separately on Thursday, Washington moved against digital currency networks it says are being used to give sanctioned Iranian entities illegal access to the international financial system.

The moves also come amid a more than six-month-old war in Iran that has reached a stalemate.

The US Treasury and State Departments announced that they had targeted two companies — BitBank and the Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Co. — and three associates of BitBank’s previously sanctioned chief, Babak Zanjani, who are accused of playing a role in helping Iran evade sanctions.

At the United Nations, Iran’s UN mission thanked China and Russia for vetoing the US resolution, saying on social media that the countries “prevented yet another cynical attempt by the United States and its allies to abuse the Security Council for their political purposes.”

Since Israel and the US struck Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025, UN nuclear inspectors have been unable to verify the status of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium.

The UN nuclear watchdog has said Iran maintained a stockpile of 440.9 kilograms of uranium enriched up to 60% purity — a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90%.

Russian UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia reiterated Moscow’s claim that the “snapback” of sanctions against Iran was illegal, and therefore the resolution to extend the mandate of the panel of experts “was deeply flawed and did not have any legal basis.”

Russia and China had strongly urged the US and its allies not to put the resolution to a vote, which would only increase tensions in the council, Nebenzia said, but Washington “decided to opt for confrontation.”

According to the French UN Ambassador Jerome Bonnafont, the current council president, implementing sanctions is “a crucial instrument to encourage Iran” to return to its nuclear obligations. France will study how to ensure sanctions are enforced, he said.

One possibility would be to follow what happened after the North Korea panel of experts was abolished: establishing a monitoring team that includes France, Germany, the UK and the United States.

Washington's deputy ambassador to the UN, Jennifer Locetta, said Washington wasn’t surprised by the vetoes on Thursday because the experts “would have shone the light” on prohibited cooperation between Iran and its partners.

According to Locetta, the vetoes are part of a broader effort to prevent expert monitoring of sanctions and even the appointment of panel members "to stifle reporting that implicates their own activities in support of rogue regimes.”

While the panel of experts for Iran was authorised a year ago and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres proposed members, they were never approved.

“Without an independent panel of experts, this council loses its principal source of impartial, evidence-based reporting on sanctions violations, creating a monitoring gap that only benefits the Iranian regime and those who profit from evading those measures,” Locetta warned.