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Rouhani Says Iran Will Begin Enriching Uranium at Higher Level in Days Rouhani Says Iran Will Begin Enriching Uranium at Higher Level in Days
(about 3 hours later)
LONDON — Iran will “take the next step” on Sunday in enriching uranium beyond the levels specified under its 2015 accord with the United States and other global powers, President Hassan Rouhani said Wednesday, according to state news outlets. LONDON — Iran will “take the next step” on Sunday and begin to enrich uranium beyond the levels specified under its 2015 accord with the United States and other global powers, President Hassan Rouhani said Wednesday, state news outlets reported.
Mr. Rouhani’s pledge to accelerate the country’s uranium enrichment is the latest step in an escalating confrontation with the United States over President Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear pact and imposition of crippling economic sanctions on Iran.Mr. Rouhani’s pledge to accelerate the country’s uranium enrichment is the latest step in an escalating confrontation with the United States over President Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear pact and imposition of crippling economic sanctions on Iran.
The United States and several other countries had agreed in 2015 to lift sweeping economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for limitations on its nuclear activity to ensure that Tehran did not develop a nuclear weapon. On Monday, Tehran increased its stockpile of low-grade enriched uranium above the cap stipulated in the accord. But its announced intention to enrich uranium to a higher level of purity is considered a far more significant breach of the nuclear deal, as it would bring Iran much closer to producing a nuclear weapon.
Mr. Trump withdrew from that deal last year, demanding that Iran agree to more stringent limits on its nuclear and conventional military activities. This May, the United States tightened its system of economic penalties on Iran in an attempt to block the country’s oil sales. Iran has maintained over the years that its nuclear program was for peaceful purposes, and that the more highly enriched uranium was intended for use in a reactor that produces medical isotopes.
Mr. Rouhani’s statement on Wednesday is the latest indication that the 2015 agreement may soon be obsolete, reviving questions over whether Iran may seek to develop a nuclear weapon and whether the United States or Israel might then take military action to try to stop it. But to forestall Iran’s decades-long pursuit of the technology to build a nuclear bomb, the United States, the European Union and several world powers agreed in 2015 to lift sweeping economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for limitations on its nuclear activity to ensure that Tehran ceased its efforts to build a nuclear weapon.
The Iranian leader had said in May that his country would begin calibrated steps to move its nuclear program beyond the limits agreed to under the 2015 deal if the Western signatories did not provide relief from the American sanctions. Mr. Trump withdrew from that deal last year, demanding that Iran agree to more stringent limits on its nuclear and conventional military activities. This May, the United States added to its “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran by moving to block the country’s oil sales anywhere in the world, cutting its exports to around 300,000 barrels a day from 2.5 million. Officials in Tehran have denounced those latest restrictions as “economic warfare.”
Mr. Rouhani and other Iranian officials have argued that Iran cannot be bound by its end of the deal if the other side has stopped complying. In early May he gave the European Union, which continues to support the 2015 deal, a deadline of 60 days to come up with measures to alleviate the pain of the sanctions. The other signatories to the nuclear deal — Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia — have continued to support it and urged Iran to do the same. But Tehran has threatened to renounce the agreement unless the European nations take measures to relieve the economic pain inflicted by the United States.
After remaining within the nuclear deal’s provisions for more than a year after Mr. Trump withdrew from it, Iran this week for the first time raised its stockpile of low-enriched uranium above the threshold set under the agreement — a small, reversible step that served as a warning that the deal was in imminent danger. The demise of the pact would revive questions about whether Tehran is seeking to develop a nuclear weapon and, if so, whether the United States or Israel might then take military action to prevent that.
The next expected step would involve Iran’s stockpile of purer, more highly enriched uranium, potentially bringing it closer to producing a nuclear weapon. Tensions between Washington and Tehran are already spilling out in other ways. The United States was within minutes of launching a missile strike against Iran last month in retaliation for the shooting down of an American surveillance drone, before Mr. Trump reversed the order.
Iran has said it will not seek such a weapon. Mr. Rouhani said that Iran’s reduction of its obligations was an attempt to save the nuclear deal rather than cause conflict. The United States and other allies have also accused Iran of using naval mines to damage a total of six tankers in two attacks around the crucial oil shipping lanes in and out of the Persian Gulf, accusations Iranian officials have denied.
Speaking at a cabinet meeting in Tehran, Mr. Rouhani said that Iran would move on Sunday to enrich uranium to higher levels “in any amount that we want, any amount that is required,” regardless of the limits set by the deal.
“Our advice to Europe and the United States is to go back to logic and to the negotiating table,” Mr. Rouhani said. “Go back to understanding, to respecting the law and resolutions of the U.N. Security Council. Under those conditions, all of us can abide by the nuclear deal.”
The European Union, in its most significant break with the Trump administration, has sought to throw the Iranians the sort of economic lifeline that would persuade them to continue honoring the terms of the deal. But a proposed alternative trading mechanism to help Iran bypass the new American sanctions has largely failed, leading Mr. Rouhani to set a deadline of the first week in July for the Europeans to deliver on their promises of help.
As that deadline approached, Iran this week took its first small step beyond the 2015 agreement by surpassing the deal’s cap in its stockpile of low-enriched uranium.
Taken alone, that step does little to bring Iran closer to the potential development of a nuclear weapon. And the stockpile could easily be reduced to compliance by shipping the excess abroad. But the violation of the 2015 agreement nonetheless served as a warning that the pact itself was in imminent danger.
In response, top diplomats from the European Union, Britain, France and Germany released a statement on Tuesday warning that they were “extremely concerned” and that “our commitment to the nuclear deal depends on full compliance with Iran.“
They concluded by saying “We are urgently considering next steps” under the terms of the 2015 agreement, though they did not elaborate.
Mr. Rouhani’s statement on Wednesday appeared to rebuff those warnings, and Iran now seems poised to resume production of more highly enriched uranium.
The Iranians have said they are trying to preserve the nuclear deal, but they have expressed increasing impatience with the Europeans’ requests that Tehran abide by the 2015 agreement — known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or J.C.P.O.A., — long after the Trump administration stamped it a dead letter.
“Iran is committed to the full implementation of the #JCPOA: as long as E3/EU implement THEIR economic commitments,” Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammed Javad Zarif, wrote on Twitter late Tuesday night, referring to the European Union and its three signatories to the deal, Britain, France and Germany.
“So moving forward, Iran will comply with its commitments under the JCPOA in exactly the same manner as the EU/E3 have — and will — comply with theirs,” Mr. Zarif added. “Fair enough? “
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