TEHRAN - In a letter to the UN Security Council and to the UN secretary-general on Saturday, Iran’s ambassador and permanent representative to the UN said the U.S. seeks to “completely ruin” a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers.

“Given that the stated objective of the United States is to completely ruin the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and to that end, its strategy is to create legal complication through presenting unilateral arbitrary interpretations and pseudo-legal arguments, the Islamic Republic of Iran trusts that the members of the Security Council will, once again, reject the United States' continued attempt to abuse the Security Council's process, thus undermining the authority and credibility of the Council and the United Nations,” Majid Takht Ravanchi said in the letter, according to CNN.

On September 19, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the return of “all previously terminated UN sanctions” on Iran, a move that drew criticism from all parties to the JCPOA including Washington’s European allies.

“Today, the United States welcomes the return of virtually all previously terminated UN sanctions on the Islamic Republic of Iran….Sanctions are being re-imposed on Iran pursuant to the snapback process under UN Security Council resolution (UNSCR) 2231,” Pompeo said in a statement on Saturday.

According to Pompeo’s announcement all UN member states should fully comply with the UN restrictions, otherwise, they would face U.S. sanctions.

Pompeo, who leads the U.S. “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran, said, “The United States expects all UN Member States to fully comply with their obligations to implement these measures…. If UN Member States fail to fulfill their obligations to implement these sanctions, the United States is prepared to use our domestic authorities to impose consequences for those failures and ensure that Iran does not reap the benefits of UN-prohibited activity.”

All JCPOA parties, including Iran, have strongly rejected the U.S. move as illegal and void. The European signatories to the Iran nuclear deal said the U.S. announcement that all UN sanctions returned on Iran was “incapable of having legal effect.” Russia, a staunch proponent of the JCPOA, said, “UN Security Council Resolution 2231 remains unchanged and the commitments arising from it must be fulfilled in the initially agreed mode and volume on the basis of the reciprocity principle by all states.”

Iran also rejected the U.S. measure, saying the U.S. claim of snapback was “null and void.”

“U.S.'s illegal & false ‘deadline’ has come and gone. UNSC member states continue to maintain U.S. is NOT a JCPOA participant, so its claim of ‘snapback’ is null & void. U.S. is STILL in violation of JCPOA and Res 2231—swimming against international currents will only bring it more isolation,” Ravanchi said in a tweet on Sunday, shortly after Pompeo issued the statement.
 
Also on Sunday, Saeed Khatibzadeh, the spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, said the U.S. had no option but to respect international norms and regulations. The Iranian Foreign Ministry also said in a statement that the U.S. “falsely” announced the return of UN sanctions on Iran while its notification to the UN Security Council was rejected by the Council and that the process of reinstating international sanction has not been initiated at all.

SM/PA