Zarif warns Washington ‘playing with fire’ - Trump not seeking ‘regime change’
DUBAI/NEW YORK: Iran’s supreme leader upped the ante in a volatile standoff with the United States yesterday, warning Tehran would continue removing restraints on its nuclear program and retaliate for the seizure of an Iranian oil tanker. Tensions have spiked since US President Donald Trump last year abandoned world powers’ 2015 nuclear deal with Iran under which it agreed to curtail its enrichment of uranium in return for the lifting of global sanctions crippling its economy.
European parties to the pact decided on Monday not to trigger the deal’s dispute mechanism in favor of pursuing more talks and avert any US-Iranian military conflict, but took no action to shield Iran against a sanctions clampdown by Trump. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s ultimate authority, accused Britain, Germany and France of failing to uphold obligations under the deal to restore Iranian access to global trade, especially for Tehran’s oil exports blocked by US sanctions.
"According to our foreign minister, Europe made 11 commitments, none of which they abided by. We abided by our commitments and even beyond them. Now that we’ve begun to reduce our commitments, they oppose it. How insolent! You didn’t abide by your commitments!” Khamenei said, according to his website. "We have started to reduce our commitments and this trend shall continue,” Khamenei said in remarks carried by state television.
He has previously upbraided European powers for not standing up to Trump and circumventing his sanctions noose. Russia and China are also parties to the accord. But it was the first time Khamenei explicitly pledged to press ahead with breaches of the nuclear deal, spurning European appeals to Iran to restore limits on enrichment aimed at obviating any dash to developing atomic bombs. "So far, efforts to win gestures from Iran to de-escalate the crisis are not succeeding (as) Tehran is demanding the lifting of sanctions on its oil and banking sectors first,” a European diplomatic source told Reuters.
Iran has long denied any intent to acquire nuclear weapons, and has said all its breaches could be reversed if Washington returned to the deal and its economic dividends were realized. Tehran has accused Washington of waging "economic war”. "Western governments’ major vice is their arrogance,” Khamenei said. "If the country opposing them is a weak one, their arrogance works. But if it’s a country that knows and stands up against them, they will be defeated.”
IAEA inspectors last week confirmed Iran is now enriching uranium to 4.5 percent fissile purity, the second breach in as many weeks after Tehran exceeded limits on its stock of low-enriched uranium. The level at which Iran is now refining uranium is still well below the 20 percent purity of enrichment Iran reached before the deal, and the 90 percent needed to yield bomb-grade nuclear fuel. Low-enriched uranium provides fuel for civilian power plants.
European Union foreign ministers, in a meeting on Monday, deemed Iran’s violations not to be "significant”, drawing Israeli accusations of appeasement recalling failed diplomacy with Nazi Germany in the run-up to World War Two. British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said on Monday Iran remained "a good year away from developing a nuclear bomb”, adding there was still a "small window to keep the deal alive”. The Europeans are trying to set up Instex, a barter-based trade conduit with Iran but it would initially deal only in items not subject to US sanctions - such as pharmaceuticals and foods. Iran has said Instex must include oil sales or provide substantial credit facilities for it to be beneficial.
Khamenei also said Iran would respond to Britain’s "piracy” over the seizure in early July of an Iranian oil tanker in Gibraltar. "Evil Britain commits piracy and steals our ship … and gives it a legal appearance. The Islamic Republic…will not leave this wickedness unanswered and will respond to it at an appropriate time and place,” he said. Iran has called on Britain to immediately release the vessel, which was detained by British Royal Marines on the suspicion that it was breaking European sanctions by taking oil to Tehran’s close ally Syria.
Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif warned Monday that the United States is "playing with fire”, echoing remarks by Trump. "I think the United States is playing with fire,” Zarif told NBC News. Iran announced last week that it had enriched uranium past the 3.67 percent limit set by the nuclear deal, and has also surpassed the 300-kg cap on enriched uranium reserves. But "it can be reversed within hours,” Zarif told the channel, adding: "We are not about to develop nuclear weapons. Had we wanted to develop nuclear weapons, we would have been able to do it (a) long time ago.”
Zarif’s comments came as the United States imposed unusually harsh restrictions on his movements during a visit to the United Nations. Weeks after the United States threatened sanctions against Zarif, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that Washington issued him a visa but forbade him from moving beyond six blocks of Iran’s UN mission in Midtown Manhattan. "US diplomats don’t roam around Tehran, so we don’t see any reason for Iranian diplomats to roam freely around New York City, either,” Pompeo told The Washington Post.
No US diplomats are based in Iran as the two countries broke off relations in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic revolution that toppled the Western-backed shah. "Foreign Minister Zarif, he uses the freedoms of the United States to come here and spread malign propaganda,” the top US diplomat said. UN spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters that the UN Secretariat was in contact with the US and Iranian missions about Zarif’s travel restrictions and "has conveyed its concerns to the host country”.
The United States, as host of the United Nations, has an agreement to issue visas promptly to foreign diplomats on UN business and only rarely declines. Washington generally bars diplomats of hostile nations from traveling outside a 40-km radius of New York’s Columbus Circle. Zarif is scheduled to speak today at the UN Economic and Social Council, which is holding a high-level meeting on sustainable development.
Despite the restrictions, the decision to admit Zarif is the latest sign that Trump’s administration appears to be retreating from its vow to place sanctions on him as part of its "maximum pressure” campaign on Iran. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on June 24 that sanctions against Zarif would come later that week. Critics questioned the legal rationale for targeting Zarif and noted that sanctions would all but end the possibility of dialogue - which Trump has said is his goal. Zarif said in an interview with The New York Times he would not be affected by sanctions as he owns no assets outside of Iran.
Trump said yesterday the United States is not pushing to topple Iran’s leadership but is determined to stop it acquiring nuclear weapons. "We are not looking for regime change. We are not looking for that at all,” Trump said during a cabinet meeting. "They can’t have a nuclear weapon.”
According to leaked diplomatic cables published at the weekend, Britain’s ambassador to Washington believed Trump pulled out of the nuclear deal because it was associated with his predecessor Barack Obama. "The administration is set upon an act of diplomatic vandalism, seemingly for ideological and personality reasons - it was Obama’s deal,” wrote the envoy, Kim Darroch, who resigned amid a storm triggered by the release of the sensitive documents. - Agencies