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Donald Trump wants to kill the Iran nuclear deal – but not just yet

Trump’s not killing the Iran deal — yet  But this could be the last time he extends it. Vox, By Zeeshan Aleem@ZeeshanAleemzeeshan.aleem@vox.com   Jan 12, 2018, President Donald Trump has decided to extend the Iran nuclear deal once more — but it may be the last time he does it.

The president announced Friday that he wouldn’t reimpose economic sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, a move that would have effectively killed the Obama administration’s landmark nuclear deal in Tehran in 2015 and isolated the US from allies around the world.

Trump is legally required to decide every 120 days whether or not he’ll put the sanctions back into effect. In his statement Friday, the president said he’d reimpose the measures next time the deadline comes around unless European allies put stricter limitations on what Iran is allowed to do under the pact.

“Today I am waiving the application of certain nuclear sanctions, but only in order to secure our European allies’ agreement to fix the terrible flaws of the Iran nuclear deal,” Trump said in a statement. “This is a last chance.”

According to senior administration officials, Trump wants to establish new sanctions on Iran tied to the way it handles its ballistic missile program, inspections of its nuclear sites by international monitors, and any expansion of the Iran’s nuclear program that causes the country to come within a year of “nuclear breakout,” the amount of time it would take to produce enough fuel for a single nuclear weapon.

Trump also said he expects Congress to craft new legislation that would “deny Iran all paths to a nuclear weapon — not just for ten years, but forever.”

The Trump administration also announced new sanctions against 14 Iranian nationals and organizations for behavior unrelated to the country’s nuclear program. Those measures are being imposed on Iran for its government’s human rights abuses and censorship, mainly tied to widespread national protests in Iran in recent weeks……

Trump’s decision to extend the deal is in some ways a surprising move — late last year he declared the deal wasn’t in the national security interests of the US. It represents a tentative win for Secretary of Defense James Mattis and other top aides, who have spent months lobbying the president to preserve the deal. And it prevents, at least for now, what could have been a nasty fight with America’s closest allies, who believe the deal is working and have made clear that the US would stand alone if Trump pulled out of it.

The question is whether or not Trump is actually willing to kill the pact four months from now if the US and Europeans can’t strike a deal……https://www.vox.com/world/2018/1/11/16826786/trump-iran-deal-sanctions-withdraw

January 13, 2018 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Iran, politics international, USA