European Union foreign ministers are backing the Iran nuclear agreement, saying the accord is working and is a key part of non-proliferation efforts despite US President Donald Trump withdrawing his support for it.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, whose team has been a key player in drawing up the deal to curtail Iran’s nuclear ambitions, suggests that domestic US politics was at play in Trump’s decision.
She says she will visit Washington early next month to urge US lawmakers not to pull out of the landmark 2015 deal curbing Tehran’s nuclear program in return for the lifting of punitive sanctions.
High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini arrives for a EU Foreign Affairs meeting in Luxembourg on October 16, 2017. (AFP/JOHN THYS)
Trump “decertified” the deal Friday, angrily accusing Iran of violating the 2015 international nuclear accord, and directed the US Congress to make it more stringent. But he did not pull the US out or re-impose nuclear sanctions.
“The EU is committed to the continued full and effective implementation of all parts” of the agreement, the European ministers say in a statement.
“At a time of acute nuclear threat the EU is determined to preserve the (agreement) as a key pillar of the international non-proliferation architecture,” they say, underlining that they saw Trump’s move “as being in the context of an internal US process.”
— Agencies
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