Iran Slams Macron’s Unconstructive Comments on JCPOA

Mousavi made the remarks on Friday in reaction Emmanuel Macron’s remarks in his meeting with US President Donald Trump.

“Despite [making] some remarks and [issuing] political statements, the European parties have failed so far to fulfil their commitments under the JCPOA and their obligations following the US’ illegal withdrawal from the agreement,” Mousavi said.

The Europeans, he added, have failed to prepare the grounds for Iran to fully benefit from the multilateral agreement.

“Under the current circumstances, their move to raise issues beyond the JCPOA will not only fail to help save the JCPOA, but will also pave the way for further distrust among the parties remaining in the 2015 agreement,” the spokesman said.

He also noted that such moves will take the US closer to the goal it pursued when leaving the Iran nuclear deal, which was nothing but its collapse.

Mousavi also rejected the hackneyed, contradictory, and groundless claims made by the US president, saying that such invalid allegations do not deserve a new reaction.

The Iranian spokesman’s comments came after Macron told Trump he doesn’t think Paris and Washington have differences over Iran.

“I think we do share the same objective on Iran,” the French leader said.

He listed four common priorities of the US and France in addressing Iranian behaviour moving forward: preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, reducing Iran’s ballistic activity, containing Iran’s regional activity and establishing peace in the region. 

“All the other debates are about technicalities,” he said, calling for fresh negotiations to extend the terms of the JCPOA and to achieve those goals.

Trump also asserted on Thursday that sanctions imposed by the US after pulling out of the agreement have crippled Iran’s economy and left the nation in tatters.

“They’re doing very poorly as a nation,” he said. “They’re failing as a nation. And I don’t want them to fail as a nation. We can turn that around very quickly, but the sanctions have been extraordinary how powerful they’ve been, and other things. I understand they want to talk and if they want to talk that’s fine.”