Europe won’t compromise with US over Iran sanctions

New York: European participants of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) will not compromise with the United States over Washington’s move to reactivate sanctions on Iran, French President Emmanuel Macron said at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meeting on Tuesday.

“We will not compromise on the activation of a mechanism that the United States is not in a position to activate on its own after leaving the agreement,” Sputnik quoted Macron as saying. “That would be to undermine the Security Council and the integrity of its decisions and would further exacerbate tensions in the region.”

Macron remarks come in the backdrop of the United States slapping new sanctions on Iranian officials and entities after its effort to reimpose UN sanctions on Tehran over the weekend was largely rejected.

Some of those sanctions including against the Iranian Ministry of Defence and embattled Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro were taken under a new executive order issued, which is aimed at deterring conventional arms transfers to Iran.

In 2015, Iran signed the JCPOA with Russia, China, France, Germany, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

It required that Iran scale back its nuclear program and severely downgrade its uranium reserves in exchange for sanctions relief, including lifting the arms embargo five years after the deal’s adoption. In 2018, the US abandoned its conciliatory stance on Iran, withdrawing from the JCPOA and implementing hard-line policies against Tehran.

The US recently said it unilaterally reimposed UN sanctions on Iran that had been lifted under the Iran nuclear deal, according to CNN.

However, the efforts of the US were rejected by other members of the UN Security Council, who said that Washington does not have the legal authority to impose snapback sanctions as it had pulled out from the agreement.

Source: ANI