Iran Tells Europe to Step Up and Save Nuclear Deal

Iran poured scorn on threatened US sanctions on Tuesday and told European powers to step up and salvage its international nuclear deal - though Germany signaled there was only so much it could do to fend off Washington’s economic clout, according to Reuters.

Senior Iranian military and political figures queued up to issue defiant statements a day after Washington threatened “the strongest sanctions in history” if Iran failed to make a series of sweeping changes.

Two weeks on from US President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the nuclear pact, his administration told Iran to drop its nuclear programme and pull out of the Syrian civil war among other demands, setting Washington and Tehran further on a course of confrontation.

“The people of Iran should stand united in the face of this and they will deliver a strong punch to the mouth of the American Secretary of State and anyone who backs them,” Ismail Kowsari, a senior commander with Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said, according to the Iranian Labour News Agency.

The 2015 nuclear agreement, worked out by the United States, France, Germany, Britain, Russia, China and Iran, lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for Tehran limiting its atomic program.

Trump called it the worst deal ever negotiated but European powers see it as the best chance of stopping Iran developing a nuclear bomb.