JCPOA - Page 2

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid held a joint press conference Wednesday at which they said Iran is running out of time to return to compliance with the nuclear deal.

The Biden administration announced Saturday sanctions imposed by Donald Trump against two Iranian companies that backed Tehran’s illicit nuclear missile programs will be lifted immediately.

Outgoing German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Sunday said talks surrounding a return to the nuclear deal have entered “very decisive weeks,” and warned every day without an accord would see the regime in Tehran continue to enrich uranium.

The U.S. on Monday accused Iran of violating an agreement made only two weeks ago by barring International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors from a workshop where uranium enrichment centrifuges are produced. The U.S. threatened Iran with “diplomatic retaliation” if it continues obstructing inspectors.

Defiant Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Wednesday warned the U.S. and Europe not to take a “counterproductive approach” at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), or Iran will halt even the tiny amount of grudging cooperation it has been providing to nuclear weapons monitors.

The Biden administration acknowledges a return to the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran is unlikely and is open to Israeli alternatives, according to a senior member of visiting Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s entourage in Washington.

Hezbollah terrorist chief Hassan Nasrallah on Thursday confirmed an oil tanker is readying to sail for Lebanon from Iran, in clear defiance of U.S. sanctions.

On a visit to Israel, a top Bahraini diplomat said the Obama-led 2015 Iran nuclear deal had done nothing but leave the region with more turmoil, violence, hatred and death.

Former Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Larijani slammed the United States in an interview that aired on Iran TV on Saturday, mocking America’s founders and culture while touting its new ability to confront the U.S., in part due to its strengthening of ties with China.

A sabotage attempt on one of the facilities of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization that Iran claimed to have thwarted caused “major damage,” the Jerusalem Post has reported.

Iran’s new president said Monday he will not meet U.S. President Joe Biden nor negotiate over Tehran’s ballistic missile program and its support of hardline regional Islamic terror groups.

VIENNA — Further talks between Iran and global powers were planned Sunday to try to negotiate and restore a landmark 2015 agreement to contain Iranian nuclear development that was later abandoned by the Trump administration.

Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman said on Wednesday there has been “a lot of progress made” on bringing the United States back into the Iran nuclear deal, allowing formal negotiations with Iran to resume this weekend.

Iran’s failure to answer questions about the discovery of uranium particles at former undeclared sites in the country puts its claims about the “peaceful nature” of its nuclear program into question, the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog has said.

The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog warned Iran is enriching uranium to levels that “only countries making bombs” reach, and added Tehran’s nuclear program had reached the point of no return and could not go back to where it was at the time of the 2015 Obama-led deal.

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping expressed his support for Iran in a phone call Monday with his nominal counterpart, outgoing Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

Last week, Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist leader Ramez Al-Halabi expressed gratitude to the Islamic regime of Iran, attributing the source of the Gaza terror group’s arsenal and funding to the oppressive Islamic Republic of Iran.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Tuesday they warned U.S. Navy vessels to watch their behavior after Washington said warning shots were fired near Iranian fast attack boats, the latest confrontation between the rivals in the Persian Gulf.

A large group of Iranian military fast attack boats on Monday harassed six United States Navy ships escorting a guided missile submarine into the Strait of Hormuz, the Pentagon said.

Rep. Nick Kustoff (R-TN) said John Kerry should be removed from the White House if reports of him leaking intelligence to Iran are true.

President Biden is willing to lift some sanctions on Iran if it resumes compliance with the nuclear deal, the U.S. State Department said.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani held a fiery cabinet meeting on Wednesday in which he railed against suspected Israeli sabotage of the Natanz nuclear facility and vowed to increase uranium enrichment even further.

Israel’s alleged attack on a nuclear facility in Iran was likely a reaction to Joe Biden’s policy towards Iran, Ellie Cohanim said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israel would not be bound by a renegotiated nuclear deal with Iran that would see the Islamic Republic obtaining a bomb in a few years, and reiterated the Jewish State would do whatever it took to protect itself from regimes seeking its destruction.

Iranian state media on Wednesday praised Iran’s 25-year, $400 billion cooperation agreement with China as a “geopolitical game-changer” that positioned Beijing as leader of the effort to drag the United States back into the nuclear deal, even as Iran violates the deal in increasingly brazen ways.

Officials in Iran once again debunked claims by the U.S. State Department and friendly media that the Biden Administration is in “indirect” talks with Tehran on Wednesday, stating the Islamic regime has nothing to discuss without an end to every American sanction on the rogue state.

The government of Iran denied it would engage the United States in talks on Tuesday after the administration of President Joe Biden confirmed on Monday that it would send an envoy to Vienna, Austria, where the remaining signatories of the Iran nuclear deal are scheduled to discuss a path forward.

Iran has such military strength and experience in dynamic modern warfare no enemy can even dream of beating it in a conflict, Major General Hossein Salami, commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, declared Tuesday.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited Iran on Friday during a tour of six Middle Eastern nations and demanded a leading role in sustaining the Iran nuclear deal, presenting China as the new global hegemonic power and the only honest mediator between Tehran and the Western world.

Iran’s intelligence minister warned Tuesday his country would pursue nuclear weapons if sanctions on Tehran are not lifted, directly contravening the regime’s longstanding official stance that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.

Iranian state media reported Thursday that production of 20 percent enriched uranium — the last level before leaping to weapons-grade material — has far exceeded expectations.

Iranian Deputy Oil Minister Amir Hossein Zamaninia said Friday that Iran is beginning to ramp up oil production, and within two months it will reach levels comparable to its production before U.S. sanctions the Trump administration imposed in 2018.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu congratulated Joe Biden on his inauguration, but urged the new president to continue what his predecessor, Donald Trump, had started, both in forging peace deals between Israel and Arab countries and in confronting Iran.

Iran is producing half a kilo of uranium enriched  to 20 percent purity per day, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization said Monday, constituting a clear violation of the 2015 nuclear accords.

The Biden administration has already unrolled its plan to return to the 2015 nuclear deal and has begun holding quiet talks with Iran, an Israeli TV station reported Saturday.

President-elect Joe Biden’s incoming administration has a distinctly Obama-esque feel to it, with ex-career diplomats and veterans of the Obama administration named on Saturday to bulk up his State Department team.