Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Monday that French President Emmanuel Macron is correct in saying there’s no “Plan B” for the 2015 nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

“President Macron is correct in saying there’s no “Plan B” on JCPOA. It’s either all or nothing,” Zarif tweeted. 

Zarif added, “European leaders should encourage President Trump not just to stay in the nuclear deal, but more importantly to begin implementing his part of the bargain in good faith.” 

According to Reuters, Macron said in a Fox News Sunday interview that he has no “plan B” for the nuclear deal and that the U.S. should stay in the agreement as long as there is no better option.

In a statement on January 12, U.S. President Donald Trump gave Europeans only 120 days to agree to an overhaul of the nuclear agreement and said if the text of the nuclear deal is not revised he would unilaterally withdraw the U.S. from it. The deadline falls on May 12.

Iran, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council - the U.S., UK, France, Russia, and China - Germany and the European Union struck the nuclear deal in July 2015. The deal took effect in January 2016.

Zarif warns U.S. of consequences of killing JCPOA

In a Press conference in New York on Sunday, Zarif warned the U.S. of consequences of killing the nuclear deal.

“If they want to kill the deal, they have that option, but they have to face the consequences,” The New Yorker quoted Zarif as saying. 

“It’s dangerous to be arrogant, very dangerous,” Zarif warned.

For fifteen months, he added, Trump has already tried to sabotage the accord by disrupting normal business with Iran.

“It’s important for Iran to receive the benefits of the agreement,” he said.

Iran’s third option is the most drastic: the country could decide to walk away from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, or N.P.T., the landmark agreement now signed by a hundred and ninety-one nations.

Zarif said Tehran has three broad choices if Trump opts out. In the first, Iran could withdraw from the deal, terminate compliance, and resume—even increase—its uranium enrichment.

“America never should have feared Iran producing a nuclear bomb. But we will pursue vigorously our nuclear enrichment,” he said.

Iran’s second option exploits a dispute mechanism in the deal, which allows any party to file a formal complaint with a commission established to adjudicate violations.

“The objective of the process is to bring the United States into compliance,” Zarif said.

Iran’s third option is the most drastic: the country could decide to walk away from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, or N.P.T., the landmark agreement now signed by a hundred and ninety-one nations.

“Iran is not a monolith,” Zarif said.

He added, “The United States has not only failed to implement its side but is even asking for more.”

“That’s a very dangerous message to send to the people of Iran, but also to the people of the world—that you should never come to an agreement with the United States, because, at the end of the day, the operating principle for the United States is ‘what’s mine is mine, what’s yours is negotiable.’ ”

‘Trump administration was never in the JCPOA’

In an interview with Al-Monitor published on Sunday, Zarif said that the Trump administration was never in the JCPOA.

“They made sure over the last 15 months that Iran would not benefit from the economic dividends of the JCPOA, and so whatever they do in three weeks would not be a major break from the past,” he said.

NA/PA