Why in News?

• Iran has warned to withdraw from the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) if the state parties to JCPOA refer the dispute over its atomic programme to the United Nation Security Council.

Background Info:

• Iran had signed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPoA) in 2015 with US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China that had offered it access to global trade in return for accepting curbs to its atomic program.
• S.A has been complaining that the treaty was too lenient towards Iran and unilaterally pulled out the pact in 2018 and re-imposed sanctions on Iran.
• The recent assassination of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani by U.S has escalated tensions in the international arena. Later Iran claimed that it restarted its process of enriching uranium beyond the limits of JCPOA.
• Amid this rising tensions, Britain, France and Germany declared that Iran was violating the 2015 pact and have launched a dispute mechanism that could eventually see the matter referred back to the Security Council and the re-imposition of U.N. sanctions.

About Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT):

• The NPT is an international treaty whose objective is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology, to foster the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, and to further the goal of disarmament.
• The treaty was signed in 1968 and entered into force in 1970. Presently, it has 190 member states.
• It requires the member countries to give up any present or future plans to build nuclear weapons in return for access to peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
• It represents the only binding commitment in a multilateral treaty to the goal of disarmament by the nuclear-weapon States.
• Nuclear-weapon states under the NPT are defined as those that manufactured and exploded a nuclear weapon or other nuclear explosive devices before January 1, 1967.