US Foreign Minister Mike Pompeo clearly warned Thursday, July 30 that the United States would attempt to impose a reinstatement of UN sanctions on Iran if the international arms embargo were to expire. During a parliamentary hearing, he confirmed that Washington would present " in the near future " a resolution to the United Nations Security Council to extend this embargo on conventional arms sales to Tehran, which expires on October 18.
Read also: Iran launches underground missiles during exercises in the Gulf
" We hope that it will be approved by the other permanent members " of the Council, he said, while considering it likely that China, even Russia, will use their right of veto to oppose it. " If it is not adopted, we will take the necessary measures to ensure that this arms embargo does not expire ," insisted Mike Pompeo.
Europe has reservations
The United States has already felt it has the right to impose the reinstatement of the UN economic sanctions against Tehran lifted as part of the 2015 international Iran nuclear deal - and in its mind , even though US President Donald Trump withdrew his country from this agreement in 2018.
" We have the capacity to implement this recovery and we will use it in a way to protect and defend America, " warned the secretary of state, who had never made it so clear that Washington was ready to put this threat to execution. The Trump administration believes that the 2015 agreement is insufficient to prevent Iran from acquiring the atomic bomb.
But the State Department wants to use a legal quibble: as soon as the Security Council resolution which ratified the Iran nuclear deal in 2015 presented the United States as a " participating " state, then they can impose the return. Sanctions. Washington's European allies, while showing their readiness to extend the arms embargo, have expressed their reservations about such a tactic.