President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday questioned the legitimacy of demands for a fresh nuclear agreement with Tehran, after the US and French presidents floated the idea of a “new deal”.
Rouhani spoke after French President Emmanuel Macron flew to Washington to try to persuade President Donald Trump not to scrap the 2015 agreement--under which Iran curbed its nuclear program in return for the lifting of sanctions, Reuters reported.
“They say that with a certain leader of a European country we want to make a decision about a seven-sided agreement,” Rouhani said.
“For what? With what right?” he added.
With a May 12 deadline looming for Trump to decide on restoring US economic sanctions on Tehran, Macron said he spoke to Trump on Tuesday about a “new deal” in which the United States and Europe would tackle the outstanding concerns about Iran beyond its nuclear program.
Rouhani reserved particular scorn for the US president, who has called the agreement one of the worst deals ever negotiated.
“First do what your previous president and foreign minister signed for and then talk about a new deal,” Rouhani said.
“They say a bad deal has been signed, so why didn’t your predecessors understand this,” he said, ISNA reported.
“You don’t have any background in politics. You don’t have any background in law. You don’t have any background on international treaties,” Rouhani said. “How can a tradesman, a merchant, a building constructor, a tower constructor make judgments about international affairs,” he added referring to Trump’s career as a real estate developer.
“We proved our goodwill under the JCPOA. You have violated your commitments under the deal in a variety of ways including discouraging people from investing in Iran.”
The other powers that signed the agreement with Iran--Russia, China, Germany, Britain and France--have all said they want to preserve the agreement—officially known as Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed ten times Iran's commitment to the landmark July 2015 international deal.
In a bid to salvage the deal while satisfying Trump’s call for tougher action, Macron has proposed that the US and Europe block any Iranian nuclear activity until 2025 and beyond, address Iran’s ballistic missile program and generate conditions for a political solution to contain Iran in Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.
It was unclear whether Macron made any progress in his efforts to prevent Trump from pulling out of the 2015 deal, and Trump stressed there would be repercussions should Iran restart its nuclear program.
“If Iran threatens us in any way, they will pay a price like few countries have ever paid,” Trump said.
But Trump said, “We will have a great shot at doing a much bigger, ‘maybe deal, maybe not’ deal.”
German Chancellor Angela Merkel will hold talks with Trump in Washington later in the week.
Senior Iranian officials have said repeatedly that Iran’s ballistic missile program is not for negotiation.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said the current deal with Iran is working effectively and should be preserved for the future.
Mogherini spoke after the Trump-Macron meeting, highlighting a trans-Atlantic rift on the issue.
Mogherini, speaking in Brussels, said that “on what can happen in the future we will see in the future. But there is one deal, existing, it is working, It needs to be preserved.”
