Iranian President Hassan Rouhani renewed his country’s warnings against the United States’ withdraw from the nuclear deal signed between Tehran and world powers in 2015.
In a speech made before the meeting between US President Donald Trump and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macaron, Rouhani said: “I am telling those in the White House that if they do not live up to their commitments...the Iranian government will firmly react.”
Addressing a crowd of thousands in the northeastern city of Tabriz, Rohani added: "If anyone betrays the deal, they should know that they would face severe consequences. Iran is prepared for all possible situations, according to Reuters.
In a news conference broadcast on state television, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani, for his part, said that Iran might withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty(NPT) if Trump scraps the nuclear deal.
Shamkhani told reporters before heading to Russia that the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran is ready for some “surprising actions” if the nuclear deal was scrapped.
Answering a question about the possibility of Tehran withdrawing from the NPT, Shamkhani said: “This is one of three options that we are considering.”
Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in an interview with the New Yorker magazine that Iran could decide to walk away from the NPT.
“If the US wants to kill the deal, it has that option, but it has to face the consequences,” Zarif stressed.
Meanwhile, Russia and China have submitted a draft statement expressing "unwavering support" for the Iran nuclear agreement and hope it will receive broad backing at a UN non-proliferation conference in Geneva, Russia's delegate told the meeting on Tuesday.
The Russian Foreign Ministry's Director General for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Vladimir Yermakov told the meeting that the Iran deal, known as the JCPOA, was fragile and any attempt to amend it would affect the global non-proliferation regime.
