Here’s what you need to know about the Iran nuclear agreement:
President Trump, who has called the Iran nuclear agreement the “worst deal ever,” plans to announce Friday his refusal to re-certify Iran’s compliance with the 2015 deal. Here’s what you need to know:
In 2015, President Barack Obama and the leaders of the United Kingdom, France, Russia, China, Germany and the European Union reached an agreement with Iran that required it to freeze its nuclear program for at least a decade. Obama said he wanted to make sure Iran doesn’t develop nuclear weapons, though the Iranian government said its research is for peaceful uses.
As part of the agreement, the U. S. and its allies agreed to lift international sanctions that have strangled Iran’s economy. That has given oil-rich Iran billions of fresh revenue.
U. N. inspectors say Iran is complying with the deal. But critics, including Trump, complain that Iran is using its new revenue to fund militant groups in the Middle East and develop ballistic missiles, which are not covered by the deal.
Congress requires the president to certify Iran’s compliance with the agreement every three months. Decertification does not kill the deal outright.
Trump will formally announce his decision to decertify the Iran deal, and he will also ask Congress not to reimpose economic sanctions right away. If Congress were to reimpose sanctions, Iran would object and likely back out of the deal, causing it to collapse.
Trump will call for new requirements on Iran in an effort to „fix“ the agreement, but Iran and U. S. allies say that’s not possible.
Congress may be unwilling to take punitive action against Iran on its own.
Lawmakers have three options: Do nothing and refuse to slap new sanctions on Iran, thereby keeping the existing deal alive; reimpose economic sanctions, effectively killing the agreement; or push for new negotiations for additions that Trump believes will strengthen the demands on Iran.
Allies fear that moving to kill the agreement could prompt Iran to resume its nuclear weapons program, perhaps triggering a nuclear arms race throughout the Middle East.
French President Emmanuel Macron in an interview with USA TODAY urged Trump last month to stick with the Iran nuclear deal despite his strong misgivings because „what else do we have? We would be put in the North Korea situation.“
Macron said that without the current agreement curbing Iran’s nuclear program, Tehran would be able to rush ahead with a nuclear weapons program the way North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un is, creating a new international crisis.
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump condemned the agreement as „one of the dumbest deals I’ve ever seen,“ „amateur hour“ and „a disaster.“
His first priority as president, Trump promised, would be to „dismantle“ it.
