Iran says the US sanctions against the country are a "humiliation to all international community," calling for a "collective response" to Washington's unilateralism to uphold the rule of law and prevent the US from undermining diplomacy.
The remarks were made by Iran's Ambassador to the IAEA Kazem Gharibabadi in his address to a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors on “Verification and Monitoring in the Islamic Republic of Iran in Light of United Nations Security Council resolution 2231 (2015)”.
“In humiliation to all international community, the United States’ most recent illegal and unilateral acts and sanctions brazenly and boldly disregard Security Council resolution 2231,” Gharibabadi said Friday.
He said the United States not only blatantly defies the Security Council resolution 2231 (2015), but also audaciously and preposterously coerces other States to follow suit.
“These sanctions as well as their previous reckless acts are specifically designed ‘to directly and adversely affect economic relations with Iran’ by intimidating third parties and pressuring other States to abide by their political aspirations,” he went on to say.
The Iranian envoy further referred to the US imposition of new bans as an illegal move that runs “counter to the well-established principles as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations and as accepted by the community of nations such as the sovereign equality of States, non-intervention and non-interference in internal affairs of Member States and freedom of international trade and navigation.”
“The irresponsible conduct of the United States necessitates a collective response by the international community in order to uphold the rule of law, to prevent undermining diplomacy and to protect multilateralism,” Gharibabadi said.
Gharibabadi referred to IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano’s latest confirmation of Iran’s full compliance with its end of the 2015 multinational nuclear deal, and said that was the thirteenth quarterly report by Amano which confirmed Tehran’s compliance with the JCPOA.
“These are clear indications of utmost transparency in Iran’s nuclear program,” he added.
In an address to a quarterly meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors on Thursday, Amano said, "Iran is implementing its nuclear-related commitments under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).”
“The Agency has continued to evaluate Iran’s declarations under the Additional Protocol, and has conducted complementary accesses under the Additional Protocol to all the sites and locations in Iran which it needed to visit,” he added.
The IAEA's latest report comes about two weeks after the US administration finished restoring all the anti-Iran sanctions it had lifted under the JCPOA, which has been ratified by UN Security Council Resolution 2231.
The administration of US President Donald Trump also resorted to a highly hostile campaign of maximum pressure against Iran in the aftermath of its exit from the deal, threatening "secondary sanctions" against all those firms that fail to abide by the American bans and keep doing business with Iran.
On the other camp, Iran's remaining partners and the European Union -- which represented them during the talks with Tehran in the run-up to the JCPOA -- have vowed all-out efforts to keep the deal alive and protect their firms and business links with the Islamic Republic.