President Rouhani Slams European Hypocrisy

Date: 12 November 2019 - 21:43

News ID: ۷۲۶۳۳

TEHRAN (Dispatches) – President Hassan Rouhani on Tuesday hit out at the hypocrisy of European nations for criticizing Iran’s latest step back from a nuclear deal while failing to fulfill their commitments of relief from U.S. sanctions.
On Monday Britain, France, Germany and the European Union said Iran's decision to restart activities at Fordow was "inconsistent" with a 2015 nuclear deal, claiming that "the E3/EU have fully upheld their JCPOA commitments, including sanctions-lifting as foreseen under the JCPOA".
"To my EU/E3 Colleagues: 1. ‘Fully upheld commitments under JCPOA’ YOU? Really? Just show ONE that you’ve upheld in the last 18 months,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Muhammad Javad Zarif hit back.
"2. Iran triggered-& exhausted-dispute resolution mechanism while you were procrastinating. We’re now using para36 remedies,” Zarif tweeted.
Iran says paragraph 36 of the deal allows it to reduce its commitments because other signatories are not complying.
The Islamic Republic has long blamed the Europeans for failing to provide the economic benefits it was meant to receive under the deal, known as the JCPOA, and has begun steps to reduce commitments, including producing more enriched uranium than allowed.
Last week Iran resumed enrichment at its underground Fordow nuclear facility. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed on Monday that Iran is enriching uranium at the Fordow site and rapidly accelerating enrichment more broadly.
Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna said the UN agency has been given access to the site "with the utmost cooperation and clarification".
"Cooperation between Iran and the agency on this issue is still ongoing. Therefore, any attempt to prejudge and present immature assessment of the situation would be aimed at distorting the facts for political gains," Kazem Gharib Abadi said in a statement.
A year after the U.S. pullout from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Iran began reducing its commitments to the deal hoping to win concessions from those still party to the accord.
Iran's latest measure came last week, when engineers began feeding uranium hexafluoride gas into mothballed enrichment centrifuges at the underground Fordow plant south of Tehran.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and European parties to the deal - Britain, France and Germany - issued a statement on Monday urging Tehran to comply fully with the accord or face action which could include sanctions.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Mass threatened the use of "all the mechanisms laid down in the agreement" to make Iran comply with its obligations under the JCPOA.
Some Iranian officials have warned that reimposition of EU and UN sanctions would be a red line that would cause the deal to collapse.
Iran says it will further overstep the deal’s limits in January if Britain, France and Germany fail to shield its economy from U.S. sanctions.
On Tuesday, Rouhani said Iran only began scaling back its nuclear commitments a year after the U.S. withdrawal to give the other parties time to make up for it.
"We waited for a year,” Rouhani told a televised news conference. "Nobody in the world can blame us by saying ‘Why are you abandoning your commitments under the JCPOA today and why have you launched Fordow today?’” he said.  "This is a problem that the enemy has created for us,” he said, referring to the United States.
Iran’s approach, he said, was to take "the path of resistance and perseverance” by reducing commitments under the JCPOA and engaging in negotiations.
"We are negotiating with the world... they are giving us proposals, we’re giving them proposals. Up until today, I have not accepted the proposals I’ve been given.”