Iran-JCPOA Parties Cooperation Shows US Isolation: Envoy
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iran’s Ambassador to Moscow Mehdi Sanaei said the close cooperation between Iran and the other parties to the 2015 nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) proves that it is Washington, not Tehran, that has become isolated.
“The international community condemns the US move to unilaterally withdraw from the nuclear deal,” Sanaei told Izvestia, a Russian-language daily newspaper.
“It is clear to everyone that the responsibility for this decision does not lay with an individual but lays with the US administration,” he said.
“One individual even as a president cannot cancel agreements reached in the former president’s term,” the envoy added.
He went on to say that the remaining parties to the JCPOA held meetings and consultations on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, which indicates that the one who became isolated after withdrawing from the nuclear deal is the United States, not Iran.
The European Union has vowed to counter US President Donald Trump’s renewed sanctions on Iran, including by means of a new law to shield European companies from punitive measures.
On May 8, the US president pulled his country out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear deal that was achieved in Vienna in 2015 after years of negotiations among Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany).
Following the US exit, Iran and the remaining parties launched talks to save the accord.
Trump on August 6 signed an executive order re-imposing many sanctions on Iran, three months after pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal.
He said the US policy is to levy “maximum economic pressure” on the country.
Trump also restated his opinion that the 2015 Iran nuclear deal was a “horrible, one-sided deal”.