Australian FM Warns Trump against JCPOA Withdrawal
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop said there is a "powerful argument" that US President Donald Trump's threat to scrap the 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers could imperil efforts to negotiate a peaceful outcome with North Korea.
Bishop said she had asked US officials, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, how they would counter the argument that North Korea could not trust the US if it walked away from its previous international agreements, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.
By endorsing the argument that ditching the deal could set back efforts to negotiate with North Korea over its nuclear program, Bishop is, in fact, pressuring the White House not to push ahead with what many international experts say would be a self-defeating move but one in which Trump is personally invested.
Bishop added that she had discussed the matter with American officials last month after Iran mounted the argument to the United Nations General Assembly that the US would lose credibility including in its stand-off with North Korea.
On October 13, Trump refused to certify that Iran is complying with the accord. But Trump, breaking his campaign pledge to rip up the agreement, did not pull the US out or re-impose nuclear sanctions against Iran.
Trump instead punted the issue to Congress, instructing lawmakers to toughen the law that governs US participation in the deal and calling on the other parties to the accord to fix a series of deficiencies.
Recently, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei warned that Iran would shred the nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), if the US tears it up.
Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany) reached the 159-page nuclear agreement in July 2015 and implemented it in January 2016.
Since the historic deal was signed in Vienna, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly confirmed the Islamic Republic’s compliance with its commitments under the JCPOA, but some other parties, especially the US, have failed to live up to their undertakings.