US to end sanctions waivers in Iran

Guards unveil scores of upgraded defensive speedboats in Gulf

The US said it will terminate sanctions waivers that had allowed Russian, Chinese and European companies to carry out work originally designed to make it harder for Iranian nuclear sites to be used for weapons development.

The waivers, which officials said expire on July 27, covered the conversion of Iran’s Arak heavy water research reactor, the provision of enriched uranium for its Tehran Research Reactor and the transfer of spent and scrap reactor fuel abroad. “The Iranian regime has continued its nuclear brinkmanship by expanding proliferation sensitive activities,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.

Pompeo said Washington would extend for 90 days a waiver allowing foreign work at a Russian-built nuclear power plant at Bushehr to ensure safety.

Iran dismissed the impact of Washington’s decision. It is a bid “to distract public opinion from its continued defeats at the hands of Iran,” Behrouz Kamalvandi, spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, said.

No impact

“Ending waivers for nuclear cooperation with Iran has effectively no impact on Iran’s continued work” on what the Islamic republic insists is a purely civilian nuclear energy programme, Kamalvandi added.

Meanwhile, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) yesterday unveiled scores of new and upgraded defensive speedboats with a warning to the US that it won’t shy away from challenging American naval power.

“Today we announce that wherever the Americans are, we’re right there beside you, and in the near future you will sense us even more,” IRGC Navy Commander Admiral Alireza Tangsiri said on the sidelines of a ceremony in the Gulf.