© APIranian President Hassan Rouhani
As promised, Iran is partially pulling out of the JCPOA nuclear deal. This can be called a "phase one withdrawal" since other phases are expected to follow in the coming months. The basis for this act is not limited to the actions of US President Donald Trump - who shredded the JCPOA deal unilaterally -
but also to the failure of the European signatories (i.e. France, the UK and Germany) to offer any incentives for Iran to comply with the deal. This leaves the entire JCPOA agreement in a kind of limbo, now that western leaders have shown themselves untrustworthy to honour any future deals in the wake of Trump's abdication.
The absence of necessary trust and partnership seems to preclude any future pacts between nations, notably between the US, Europe and Middle Eastern countries.The size of the US market blocks any effective European move to honour its commitment to the JCPOA. In an
interview with al-Jazeera, Ellie Geranmayeh, deputy director of the European Council on Foreign Relations' Middle East and North Africa programme, sees the launch of INSTEX as important because of the political message it sends. "The E3 are preparing the roadmap to sustain trade with Iran, for now it's going to be restricted - but there is the hope that it will be expanded with time."
Europe is asking Iran to wait without offering any prospects of what it can do next. European leaders are asking for more time and "hope" to find a solution, a very nebulous prospect so long as Trump is in power and Europe is not united. Indeed, EU Foreign policy is far from being homogenous. Even if the European leaders' signatories have not imitated Trump by revoking the nuclear deal, they have offered nothing to compensate for the damage to Iran's economy created by the harsh US sanctions.
The Iran-EU commercial relationship is suffering much more than the Iran-US commercial relationship. Following Trump's ultimatum to all companies doing business with Iran, EU businesses fled Iran. Some of them paid compensation for not honouring their commitments.
Their precipitate departure undermines the prospects of future commercial deals between Iran and EU companies.Europe is allowing Iran to buy medicine and food through its new INSTEX monetary system. However, Iran can buy such supplies, with no obstacles, from nearby Turkey and other non-European countries.
The European continent has become unessential to Iran.Iran is now following through on what it promised 60 days ago, on the anniversary of Trump's revoking the nuclear deal. Iran is still very far from developing a nuclear weapon but has waited 14 months to show how its patience, a wait with no benefits to its economy while its population suffers.
Europe has nothing to offer but verbal support. It is not in a position to stand against the US; it is not prepared to face US sanctions; is lacksthe backbone to do today what France did in
1986 when it refused to give military support to US warplanes to bomb Libya.
This is just the beginning of Iran's counter measures.
Comment: Iran announced it will
increase its uranium enrichment to the level needed for the operation of Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, up from 3.67% to 5%.
Araghchi again criticized his European colleagues for failing to fulfill their commitments under the JCPOA and warned that Tehran will be further stepping away from that agreement "every 60 days" until the situation changes for the better.
The representative of the Iranian government, Ali Rabiya, also stated that Tehran is making efforts to keep the 2015 nuclear deal working, but not at the country's expense. "Iran hopes to maintain the Joint Comprehensive Action Plan, but not at any cost, and not at the expense of its national interests."
Ignoring the terms of the deal, Macron
warned of 'consequences' for Iran's 'violation' of the deal. They're not - it was the U.S. that pulled out unilaterally, and it's the EU not meeting its own commitments. By the terms of the deal, Iran is free to scale back its own commitments in response:
"The President of the Republic has agreed with his Iranian counterpart to explore by July 15 conditions to resume dialogue between the parties," the Elysee announced in a statement late Saturday, shortly after a phone call between Macron and his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani. Macron said that he would be reaching out to the Iranian authorities and other sides of the 2015 accord in hopes of diffusing tensions.
Macron's call for dialogue came with a threatening undertone, however, as he warned the Islamic Republic with retaliation if it keeps on surpassing the deal-imposed caps on its uranium stockpile and level of enrichment, saying consequences "would necessarily follow."
In his own statement after the phone call, Rouhani reiterated that the best way to revive talks and save the deal would be to suspend all sanctions imposed on Iran.
"Stopping all sanctions can be the beginning of dynamics between Iran and the P5+1," he said. "The European Union should fulfill more of its commitments and take more actions to salvage the deal."
His statement also cited Macron as effectively admitting that Europe has failed to offset the damage inflicted on the Iranian economy by the American sanctions. "We accept that Europe's actions to compensate for the US sanctions haven't been effective and successful but that we will do whatever we can to make up for it," the press release quotes Macron as saying - this part does not appear in the Elysee statement, however.
Israel - a rogue nuclear nation itself - is predictably and hysterically
warning that Iran is "marching on" towards producing nuclear weapons:
Yuval Steinitz, the country's Energy Minister and member of the Israeli security cabinet, asserted that Iran "has begun - while it is a moderate rise right now - but it has begun to raise, to break out of the uranium enrichment curbs that were imposed on it," he told Ynet TV.
Upping the ante, Steinitz, a renowned Iran hardliner, also claimed that Tehran "is brushing off the red lines that were agreed [under the 2015 nuclear deal and] that it has begun its march, a march that is not simple, toward nuclear weaponry."
Israel has been crying "Iranian nuclear wolf" for decades. It's a wonder anyone is still listening to them. Netanyahu went
full retard, comparing the uranium enrichment with the Nazis' march into the Rhineland in 1936:
This sort of thinking is a "mistake," Netanyahu said, noting that the Second World War began "when Nazi Germany took one small step - to enter the Rhineland [in 1936]. A small step. No one said anything and no one did anything. The next step was the Anschluss [the annexation of Austria in 1938] and the next step was entering the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia [in 1938]. And the rest is known."
Alleging that the enriched uranium could be used "for only one thing - to prepare nuclear weapons," Netanyahu appealed to his "friends, the heads of France, Britain and Germany," telling them "you signed this agreement, and you said that once they take this step, there will be harsh sanctions. That was the decision of the Security Council."
Comment: Iran announced it will increase its uranium enrichment to the level needed for the operation of Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, up from 3.67% to 5%. Ignoring the terms of the deal, Macron warned of 'consequences' for Iran's 'violation' of the deal. They're not - it was the U.S. that pulled out unilaterally, and it's the EU not meeting its own commitments. By the terms of the deal, Iran is free to scale back its own commitments in response: Israel - a rogue nuclear nation itself - is predictably and hysterically warning that Iran is "marching on" towards producing nuclear weapons: Israel has been crying "Iranian nuclear wolf" for decades. It's a wonder anyone is still listening to them. Netanyahu went full retard, comparing the uranium enrichment with the Nazis' march into the Rhineland in 1936: