TEHRAN – Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Sunday that the U.S. has been left alone in quitting the 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

“Only a fake regime and one or two small countries supported the U.S. However, the whole world stood against the U.S. and its bullying and praised our strategic patience against the U.S., which was a difficult thing to do,” he said at a session of the Administrative Council of North Khorasan.

However, he said that there is a limit to Iran’s patience.

On May 8, Iran announced a partial withdrawal from some aspects of the nuclear pact, saying that the country would no longer adhere to some of the limits on its nuclear activities. It also threatened to step up uranium enrichment if an agreement is not made within 60 days to protect it from the sanctions’ effects.

In follow-up to that deadline, on July 7 Iran announced that it has started enriching uranium to a higher purity than the 3.67% as the Europeans missed the 60-day deadline to devise a concrete mechanism to protect the country from the U.S. sanctions.

NA/PA