Written by Staff Writer in London
Hassan Rouhani, president of Iran, said that the US needs to persuade the international community to reinstate sanctions Iran if it wants to get the 2015 nuclear deal re-started.
“The main obstacle to continuing the deal is not Iran but the unbalanced approach of certain Western countries against the Iranian nation,” Rouhani said Saturday in an interview with media in the city of Yazd.
“Today, there is no other country in the world whose nuclear program is subject to total surveillance, while nuclear activity in Iran was put in abeyance and there was no nuclear weapon or bomb.”
Iran last year agreed to curb its nuclear program in exchange for lifting most US sanctions, but Trump abandoned the accord in May, claiming Iran was not living up to its obligations.
Rouhani said the deal was mainly in Iran’s interests.
“We kept our doors open to cooperation with the United States but there is no agreement that is in everyone’s interest,” he said.
“American companies need to persuade the international community to reinstate sanctions to not let the implementation of the nuclear deal be put on hold. The international community must convince the United States that sanctions against Iran have value for the United States and for the world at large.”