The US will activate a clause of the nuclear agreement with Iran to restore sanctions

The US president, Donald Trump said on Saturday that the mechanism, known as "snapback" (recover), would be promoted this week but the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo , which confirmed the decision, did not give a precise date.

"The president clearly said that we would do it soon and that is what we will do," he said.

The "snapback" seeks to restore all international sanctions against Iran that were lifted in 201 5 after the Islamic Republic agreed to the commitment not to equip itself with nuclear weapons with the 5 + 1 Group (United States, Russia, China, France, United Kingdom and Germany).

Trump considered the nuclear agreement insufficient, so he withdrew the United States in 2018 and re-imposed, and even tightened, unilateral sanctions on Iran.

The United States now relies on a legally contested interpretation. Pompeo intends to claim for the United States the status of "participant" of that agreement even though it abandoned it.

According to the 2015 agreement, the "participating" states can unilaterally denounce a signatory for not respecting your commitments. This procedure allows the reestablishment of sanctions to be achieved within 30 days without the possibility that other partners, such as China or Russia, can veto it.

However, almost all the other members of the Security Council, including allies Europeans from Washington, contest this interpretation and are unlikely to agree to reinstate the punitive measures.

"We expect all the countries of the world to respect their obligations, including the 5 Ps"; as permanent members of the Council are called and with veto power, Pompeo warned.

Iranian President, Hasán Rohaní insisted this Wednesday that the Trump administration "has no right" to activate this clause.

" Common sense tells us that this mechanism is only valid for those who are part of the agreement and not for those who ceased to be part of it," he stated.

In this In this sense, Rohaní stressed that continuing to be part of the nuclear agreement was "a very wise decision" on Iran's part. "If we had left the agreement after the United States, we would now have to face the problems and costs that UN resolutions entail," he said.