TEHRAN — Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani has censured the United States’ continuous assault on the Iran nuclear agreement and criticized Europe’s inaction in the face of Washington’s anti-Iran campaign.

Larijani made the criticism in a meeting with European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell in Tehran late on Monday, when the two sides discussed the nuclear deal-related issues among other things.

The parliament speaker also voiced Iran’s readiness to help resolve regional issues.

Borrell voiced the European Union’s readiness for cooperating with Iran on bilateral and regional issues.

He also expressed his condolences over the assassination of Iran’s top anti-terror general Qassem Soleimani, who was targeted in a U.S. drone strike ordered directly by U.S. President Donald Trump.

This was the new EU foreign policy chief’s first visit to Tehran since taking office.

Borrell, Spain’s former foreign minister and ex-speaker of the European Parliament, replaced Federica Mogherini as the new EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy in late 2019.

During his visit to Tehran on Monday, he also met with President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

President Rouhani also criticized the European Union for failing to honor its commitments under the 2015 nuclear pact, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

On May 8, 2018, the U.S. unilaterally pulled out of the JCPOA and began adopting an extreme hostile policy toward Tehran under the name of “maximum pressure”. 

Under the maximum pressure policy, the U.S. targeted Iran’s oil exports with sanctions. It also blacklisted top Iranian officials and commanders.

On May 8, 2019, Iran began a bimonthly process of reducing its commitments to the JCPOA under the historic pact’s provisions. 

The move was intended to push European countries to salvage the JCPOA from U.S. pressures. Iran argued that the three European members of the deal, namely France, Britain, and Germany, have done nothing of value to protect Iran’s benefits from the deal.

Finally, Iran announced in January that it is taking the last and final step to suspend all of its commitments to the JCPOA. The decision was based on Europe’s failure to keep up its part of the deal, but Tehran clarified that it will return to the deal as soon as Europe fulfills its obligations.

MH/PA