Recent progress in negotiations over Iran's plans to enrich nuclear fuel has led to the prospect of the lifting of economic and trade sanctions by the European Union (EU) and the US. Under a provisional agreement reached between Iran and a group composed of the US, UK, France, Russia, China, and Germany on April 2 in Lausanne, Switzerland, Iran is supposed to reduce its stockpile of enriched uranium and to cease the further enrichment of its nuclear fuel to produce weapons-grade material. The Lausanne agreement is designed to pave the way for a comprehensive agreement that would include independent inspection of its enrichment facilities to ensure compliance with the agreement by Iran not to produce uranium capable of use in a nuclear bomb. In return for such an agreement, the EU and the US-along with the UN-would agree to lift a range of sanctions that impose heavy restrictions on Iran and its energy industries (see Box Iranian Sanctions: A Summary).
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