White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest stated, “the kind of provocative destabilizing actions that have been a hallmark of Iranian behavior over the last several decades” is why the US made the Iran nuclear deal a top priority on Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Lead.”
After anchor Jake Tapper said of Iran, “this does not seem look a country that is ready to be welcome back into the community of nations.” Earnest stated, “That’s right, Jake. And certainly the United States has been concerned with the kind of provocative destabilizing actions that have been a hallmark of Iranian behavior over the last several decades, in fact. and that’s why, A, that is why the United States and this president made it a priority to organize the international community to reach an agreement with Iran that will prevent them from obtaining a nuclear weapon. This agreement is actually best way for us to ensure that Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon. And based on them following through with their commitment to ship 98% of their uranium stockpile out of the country, which they followed through on over the holidays, Iran right now actually doesn’t even have the nuclear material necessary to build one nuclear weapon. That’s — and we all did all of that without a single American shot being fired. So, that’s an indication that we’re making some progress in countering the threat that is posed by Iran.”
He added, “these were sanctions imposed that were imposed on Iran over their nuclear program. And as soon as Iran takes the steps that they’ve committed to take, and those steps can be verified by international nuclear experts, then we’ll know that Iran will not develop a nuclear weapon. That said, Jake, we’re going to continue to have sanctions in place against Iran because of their support for terrorism. We’re going to continue to have sanctions in place against Iran because of their continued development of their ballistic missile program. And we have been pretty clear about the fact Iran is going to be subject to additional sanctions because of the tests that they conducted at the end of last year. So, we continue to be concerned about this situation. That precisely is why the president made preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon a top national security priority, and we’re making progress in actually accomplishing that goal.”
(h/t Daily Caller)
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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