Iran is continuing to breach its 2015 nuclear deal by enriching uranium at higher levels than the deal allows, according to NBC News — and the Middle Eastern nation has warned Europeans that they are running out of time to save the agreement.
President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Iran deal in 2018, but Iran is still bound to the deal by several European nations, including France, the U.K., and the European Union. Iran’s atomic energy spokesman, Behrouz Kamalvandi, announced Saturday that the nation was exceeding the deal’s limits on uranium enrichment and that it was close to being able to enrich uranium at the level needed to make nuclear weapons.
“Our stockpile is quickly increasing, we hope they will come to their senses,” Kamalvandi said in a press conference. “All these steps are reversible if the other side fulfills its promises.”
At the time of the nuclear deal, it was thought that Iran needed about a year of unbridled uranium enrichment to be able to make a nuclear weapon.
Making a deal
While openly admitting that it is no longer following the 2015 deal, Iran will nevertheless allow U.N. inspectors to continue to have access to its nuclear sites. For their part, European leaders have urged Iran to pull back from breaching their deal and abide by it.
France even tried to extend Iran a $15 billion offer of credit to prop up its failing economy, but that is now looking unlikely, the Associated Press reported.
Indeed, Iran has said that it wants the U.S. to lift crushing sanctions that have brought its economy to a standstill before it will agree to further talks. The U.S. has said it wants to talk before lifting sanctions.
Iran’s frustration with sanctions has been evident in several recent provocations by the nation, including its move to detain and seize oil tankers near the Strait of Hormuz and shoot down an unmanned U.S. drone that Iran said had entered its airspace.
No surprise here
Still, Iran has stopped short of directly engaging or attacking U.S. assets in the region and has given some signs that it might be willing to meet. The nation even released seven crew members from a detained British-flagged oil tanker last week as a gesture of goodwill, even as it breached its agreement.
Both Trump and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani are expected to attend the U.N. General Assembly later this month, and Trump has said he is open to meeting with Rouhani.
“It’s no surprise that the Iranians are going to pursue what the Iranians have always intended to pursue,” U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said at a news conference in Paris with his French counterpart, Florence Parly, on Saturday.
For her part, “Parly said the focus should remain on keeping Iran in the 2015 deal,” according to Haaretz. She went on to vow that France “will continue to push in that direction.”
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