October 13, 2017
Trump Vows to End Iran Deal Himself if Congress Won’t Act
President says he won’t certify that ‘rogue regime’ in Tehran is complying with nuclear agreement
wsj.com
Detailing grievances against Iran going back to 1979, the year of the country’s Islamic revolution, Mr. Trump broadly condemned the country’s rulers.
“Iranian aggression continues to this day,” he said. “The regime remains the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism.”
Mr. Trump’s move Friday deals a blow to the 2015 agreement, and touches off a high-pressure campaign in Washington and European capitals over the future of the deal.
Under a law passed in 2015 to give Congress oversight of the nuclear deal, the president must tell Congress every 90 days if Iran is complying. If the president doesn’t, that triggers a 60-day process for lawmakers to weigh whether to reimpose sanctions under expedited consideration.
Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been working closely with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on amending the law, the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, known in Washington as INARA. Sens. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) have also been involved in crafting the amended legislation.
Mr. Corker’s office said the modified legislation would aim to “address the major flaws of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) by requiring the automatic ‘snapback’ of U.S. sanctions should Iran violate enhanced and existing restrictions on its nuclear program.”
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is the formal name of the 2015 international nuclear deal under which Iran agreed to curb its nuclear program in exchange for relief from punitive economic sanctions.
Mr. Trump highlighted concerns with “sunset clauses” in the nuclear deal that allow restrictions to expire at various times.
“There are some areas that were not addressed under the nuclear agreement that we think require further addressing, most specifically the ballistic missile program and the expiration date,” Mr. Tillerson told reporters ahead of Mr. Trump’s speech.
“A reopening of the agreement…is unlikely, because Iran’s not going to reopen the agreement,” he added. More likely, Mr. Tillerson said, is a new agreement that doesn’t replace the nuclear deal but addresses these two issues.
He said discussions for “a successor deal” would begin after Congress moves to amend the 2015 oversight legislation, known as the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, though it is unclear if the Trump administration and its allies on the Hill can muster enough support to do that.
“I don’t want to suggest to you that this is a slam dunk up there on the Hill, we know it’s not,” Mr. Tillerson said. “Once that decision is made, that will guide then our diplomatic engagement.”
The process is likely to require time and painstaking negotiations. Mr. Tillerson said he hoped Congress would amend the legislation before Mr. Trump next faces another certification deadline in January.
Mr. Corker’s measure would reimpose sanctions if Iran violates restrictions spelled out in the legislation and would go beyond what is in the nuclear accord. Mr. Corker’s office said the bill would be “effectively ridding the JCPOA of its sunset provisions as they apply to U.S. sanctions,” as well as bolstering the verification powers of the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog and limiting Iran’s centrifuge program.
Mr. Corker’s office said the legislation, if passed, wouldn’t conflict with the nuclear accord but would “set conditions that halt Iran’s nuclear program and provide a window of time for firm diplomacy and pressure to work.”
By paving the way for the U.S. to reimpose sanctions for reasons not covered by the original nuclear deal, the U.S. stands to be in breach of the international agreement. The proposals also are likely to meet pushback from European officials, who have repeatedly said that they don’t want to renegotiate the deal because they believe it is working.
Mr. Trump said the U.S. would work with allies to counter Iran. The Trump administration wants to initiate talks with European partners to address key concerns, Mr. Tillerson said.
Two key areas for the talks will be Iran’s ballistic missile program and “sunset clauses” in the nuclear deal that allow restrictions to expire at various times, Mr. Tillerson said.
Mr. Tillerson said the steps announced Friday shouldn’t affect American businesses that have applied for licenses to do business authorized under the nuclear deal.
In a speech that opened with details of what Mr. Trump described as Iranian aggression, the president outlined ways, including sanctions, that the U.S. will target the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Iran’s elite military branch, which Mr. Trump said has hijacked large portions of Iran’s economy.
The IRGC won’t be classified as a foreign terrorist organization, which would expose it to more punitive U.S. laws, officials said.
“What we’re really attempting to do is curtail the IRGC’s ability to finance its terrorist activities, finance its support for terrorist activities,” Mr. Tillerson said. “The sanctions are around getting at the financing structures themselves and getting at certain individuals and penalizing people who are supporting these kinds of activities.”
He said the U.S. has been urging European partners to levy similar measures against the IRGC.
The IRGC has threatened what it has called a crushing response if designated as a terrorist organization.
Some European officials have said the European Union should look at curtailing Iran’s financial transfers to regional proxies such as Hezbollah.
The White House in a fact sheet listed numerous grievances with Tehran, including its missile program, its support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, its support for extremist groups and its alleged human-rights abuses.
It criticized the Obama administration’s policies, saying the Trump administration wouldn’t repeat what it sees as the mistakes of the Obama and Bush administrations by prioritizing the immediate threat of Sunni extremist groups over “the longer term threat of Iranian backed militancy” and would address the totality of the Iranian threat, with a particular focus on the IRGC.
Former Obama administration officials involved in negotiating the nuclear deal criticized Mr. Trump’s decision to decertify and said it could pave the way to unraveling the agreement, opening a path for Iran to resume its nuclear program.
“If the U.S. begins through congressional action or otherwise to try to change the terms of the deal, that would constitute a violation,” said Ben Rhodes, who was a deputy national security adviser to former President Barack Obama, adding that Iran had agreed under the deal not to develop a nuclear weapon.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-wont-certify-iran-is-complying-with-nuclear-deal-seeks-trigger-points-for-sanctions-1507908636
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