American Pressure Campaign Against Iran a Miscalculation

EghtesadOnline: The United States’ policy of imposing pressure on Iran to win concessions out of it was a miscalculation and will never be successful, President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday.

News ID: ۷۵۰۹۵۶

10 September 2020

“They caused the Iranian nation suffering and difficulties, but will never achieve their purposes,” he said in a Cabinet meeting, President.ir reported.

After unilaterally withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, two years ago, the US initiated a maximum pressure campaign against Iran in the hope of forcing officials in Tehran to renegotiate a new deal that would cover non-nuclear issues.

Iran maintains that any talks with the US would only be possible within the framework of the deal’s Joint Commission and once all sanctions are removed.

In response to illegal sanctions as well as the other parties’ inability to compensate for the sanctions’ economic effects, Iran reduced its JCPOA compliance in 2019 based on the provisions of the deal.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday cited a recent report by the International Atomic Energy Agency in a tweet, warning that Iran’s uranium stockpile is more than 10 times the limit set by the JCPOA.

“The E3 [European parties to the deal] and other nations must wake up to the reality that the nuclear deal is history and should join us in imposing strong sanctions,” he said.

Pompeo added that “pressure and comprehensive talks are the only path forward”.

The statement comes as Washington has mounted a bid at the United Nations Security Council to return all global sanctions on Iran through a so-called snapback mechanism foreseen in the deal, but faces opposition by the international community.

A majority of council members have indicated that the US move has no legal ground since it had officially exited the deal. They had also earlier rejected the US resolution on extending Iran’s arms embargo beyond its expiration in October.

“America’s miscalculation since 2018 … was that it thought that by using economic pressure and imposition of cruel sanctions, it could bring the great Iranian nation to its knees,” Rouhani said.

It is midway through the third year, he added, but the resistant nation of Iran has withstood all pressures while the US has only ruined its own reputation in the international arena.

The president noted that the US should definitely return to the right path and it eventually will.

“This path is a dead-end for America. It has no other way but to return to the [beginning] of this alley, otherwise it faces a solid barrier and wall,” Rouhani said.