Implying US political approach toward JCPOA;

Haley asks for decertifying Iran's compliance with JCPOA

TEHRAN (defapress) – Implying the nature of the US administration's political approach toward nuclear deal with Iran, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley laid out a case for President Donald Trump to step back from the Iran nuclear deal.

News ID: 65857

Date: 06 September 2017 - 12:02

In a carefully read 20-minute address at the American Enterprise Institute, Haley argued that the nuclear deal can't be considered in isolation.

Implying the White House political motive behind its measures and stance toward Iran and the nuclear deal with Iran, she said,  Iran's history, its hostility toward the US and its behavior in the Middle East have to figure into Trump's calculus when he decides in October whether to certify if Iran is abiding by the deal.

"What I am saying is should he decide to decertify, he has grounds to stand on," Haley said. "It's very easy to just talk about compliance and the JCPOA," she said, referring to the deal's formal name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). "But there's so much more to the story that we need to be looking at," she added, CNN reported.

The deal, reached in July 2015 and implemented in January 2016, essentially eased nuclear related sanctions in exchange for curbs on Iran's nuclear program, some of which expire after a few years. Congress passed a separate law requiring the president to certify every 90 days that Iran is in fact complying with the deal, something Trump has done twice now.

While Russia, China and the US European partners repeatedly has backed the JCPOA, Asked if the US would end up isolated for leaving a deal that has buy in from China, Russia, Germany, France, the UK and the EU, Haley claimed that European allies, who worked most closely with the Obama administration to craft the deal, understand the new US concerns.

She added that Washington's job wasn't to make sure allies were "comfortable."

"This is about US national security, this is not about European security," she said.

Haley's remarks appeared to draw a quick response from the French ambassador to the US, Gerard Araud, who tweeted a rebuke at the Trump administration's apparent attempt to move the goalposts on the Iran deal.

"The Iran deal is about the nuclear issue, nothing else," Araud tweeted. "So far, Iran is abiding by the commitments taken in this mutually agreed framework."

Haley rejected suggestions that decertifying the Iran deal could send a message to others involved in negotiations with the US -- particularly North Korea -- that Washington is an unreliable dealmaker, prone to back out of agreements as easily as it makes them.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is currently trying to pressure Pyongyang back to the negotiating table through an international "peaceful pressure" campaign.

"What's more important is that we let others know we will stay in a deal as long as it protects the security of the United States," Haley said.

Even though the US allies in the Middle East confirm the white House support for terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq, she accused Iran of supporting terrorism and proxy wars as reasons to pull back from the agreement.

"Everyone hoped the deal would make the Iranian government good people," Haley added continuing her baseless claims, "but no one looked at the history of Iran, no one looked at all the past aggressions they have shown."

When limits on Iran's uranium enrichment or centrifuge production expire, Iran may be able to send a nuclear warhead to the US, as North Korea can now, Haley claimed. "What if we just gave them 10 years, and all the money they wanted to do what they want to prepare for, when that 10th year hits and they start nuclear war?" Haley asked.