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“Bluster or threats won’t get the U.S. a new deal, particularly as it is not honoring the deal it has already made.”
Zarif’s address comes just days after Netanyahu delivered a ‘bizarre’ speech accusing Iran of harboring a secret nuclear weapons program in violation of the nuclear agreement.
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As President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continue to plow ahead with “cartoonish allegations” in an effort to undermine the Iran nuclear deal — which most Americans support, despite the disinformation campaign against it — Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said in a video on Thursday that the U.S. has “consistently violated” the terms of the accord and that the agreement will not be renegotiated.
Arguing it is Iran — and not the U.S. or Europe — that has “serious grievances” and “much to demand” in terms of diplomatic concessions, Zarif noted that his nation “has not invaded anyone in centuries, but we have been invaded, most recently [in 1980] by Saddam Hussein, who was then backed by the U.S. and its regional allies.”
“The West even actively prevented us from buying rudimentary means of defense even as Saddam Hussein showered by Iranian civilians and soldiers with chemical weapons,” Zarif noted.
Even in light of this gruesome history and recent “bluster” from the Trump administration, Zarif noted that Iran still entered into the nuclear agreement “in good faith” and has continued to comply. Zarif went on to reiterate that his nation will not “renegotiate or add onto” the deal, as French President Emmanuel Macron suggested during his visit to the U.S. last week.
Zarif also accused the U.S. of repeatedly violating the nuclear agreement “by bullying others to prevent businesses from returning to Iran.” Speaking directly to Trump in “real estate terms,” Zarif said, “when you buy a house and move your family in, or demolish it to build a skyscraper, you cannot come back two years later and renegotiate the price.”
Watch:
Zarif’s address comes just days after Netanyahu delivered a “bizarre” speech accusing Iran of harboring a secret nuclear weapons program in violation of the nuclear agreement.
Experts and United Nations officials have since dismissed Netanyahu’s presentation as badly misleading and deemed much of the information he used to make his case outdated.
Trump’s White House, however, uncritically touted Netanyahu’s speech as further evidence that the Iran deal must either be overhauled or scrapped entirely.
In an interview last month on “Face the Nation,” Zarif reiterated that his country has no plans or desire to develop nuclear weapons and will not do so, even if Trump walks away from its obligations to uphold the international agreement.
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