Critics call on Biden administration not to walk away from Iran nuclear deal despite recent rhetoric

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The Bidens administration’s Iran policy, beset by criticism that it is too soft on Tehran’s bloody crackdown on peaceful protesters and the clerical regime’s ambition to build a nuclear weapons posture, faces a new backlash from US Senator Ted Cruz, former US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley and European politicians.

Critics say statements by the Biden administration this month show loyalty to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the official name of the Iran nuclear deal, which a think tank study has found US, would funnel $275 billion in profits to Tehran in its first year and $1 trillion by 2030.

A spokesperson for Sen. Cruz, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital that “Senator Cruz believes the Biden administration is ideologically obsessed with reentering a nuclear deal with Iran, and is doing everything possible to keep that possibility open. He believes they are prioritizing the deal over other critical interests they claim to have, including supporting women-led protests against the Iranian regime and helping our Ukrainian allies eliminate Russian and Iranian forces using drones to devastate Ukrainian military and civilian targets.

The spokesperson added that the senator “fully expects the administration to deepen its obsession, including continuing to allow nuclear cooperation between Iran and Russia despite congressional sanctions if they believe it is.” is politically possible.

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The London-based Iran International news agency reported that Bidens’ special envoy to Iran, Robert Malley, recently held meetings with Iran’s UN ambassador, Saeed Iravani, “at least three times in the last two months”.

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Asked about the meetings, State Department spokesman Ned Price told Fox News Digital that “we have made it clear that we have the means to deliver specific and strong messages to Iran when it is in the interests of the Americas to do so. We have always delivered three messages to Iran: stop killing peaceful protesters, stop selling arms to Russia to kill Ukrainians, and release the Americans you have wrongfully detained. We let us also take every opportunity available to make it clear that we will take the necessary steps to protect American citizens.

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Price added, “I won’t go into detail about how we deliver these messages, but we do so in close coordination with our allies and partners and make no apologies for delivering them firmly and consistently.”

Haley told Fox News Digital: “The IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] is a terrorist organization, plain and simple. Europe should have blacklisted them years ago. Every day the farce of relaunching the Iran deal continues is another day the world is less secure.”

The Trump administration classified the IRGC as a terrorist entity in 2019.

In response to Cruz and Haley’s criticism, a US State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital, “The JCPOA hasn’t been on the agenda for months. It’s not our focus. Since September, our goal has been to defend the fundamental freedoms of the Iranian people and counter Iran’s deepening military partnership with Russia and its support for Russia’s war in Ukraine.”

The spokesperson added, “President Biden is absolutely committed to never allowing Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon. We believe that diplomacy is the best way to achieve this goal in a sustainable and verifiable way, and that the alternatives are worse”.

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Members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard march in a parade to commemorate the anniversary of the Iran-Iraq war.

In a statement to Fox News Digital, a spokesperson for the United States National Security Council echoed the State Department.

“The JCPOA is not our goal at the moment. It’s not on the agenda. Iran is killing its young people and selling drones to Russia to kill Ukrainians. Our goal is to find ways practices of confronting them in these areas. Regardless of the nuclear talks, we will continue to confront Iran’s behavior in the region, to protect our troops, including with military forces if necessary, and to support the brave Iranian people who demand his basic rights and dignity that this regime has long denied him. We will continue to take action to impose costs on those who commit violence against peaceful protesters or otherwise seek to suppress their rights,” the spokesperson said. NSC.

The European Union (EU) on Monday refused to sanction the massive 125,000-strong army without a court ruling from an EU country declaring the IRGC to be engaged in terrorist activities.

“It’s something that can’t be decided without a court decision…first. You can’t say that I consider you a terrorist because I don’t like you,” said Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat.

EU diplomats told Reuters last week that the bloc was set to add 37 names to a blacklist of Iranian individuals and entities banned from traveling to Europe and subject to an assets freeze.

The European Parliament passed a non-binding resolution last week, urging that the IRGC be included on the list of terrorist blocs. The IRGC commander and the speaker of the Iranian parliament have threatened the EU with consequences if it outlaws the IRGC as a terrorist organization.

File photo shows the flags of European Union member states blowing in the wind at dusk in front of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France. The European Parliament last week passed a non-binding resolution calling for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to be added to the bloc’s terrorism list.

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Charlie Weimers, a Swedish Conservative Member of the European Parliament (MEP), told Fox News Digital regarding the IRGC’s classification as a terrorist entity: “The Islamist regime’s henchman should face the harshest measures possible from the ‘West.

Weimers, a staunch supporter of Iranian dissidents who oppose the mullahs’ regime, added: “Obama’s deal with Iran [JCPOA] lessens the pressure on the mullahs and hurts our ally, Israel. Continued JCPOA negotiations undermine European and American security interests by granting Russia leverage through a seat at the table. It is incomprehensible that some in Europe are still clinging to transacting from a bygone region.”

Nile Gardiner, director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, told Fox News Digital: “The EU remains stuck in a terrible mood of appeasement towards Iran. The refusal to add the IRGC to the terrorism blacklist is shameful but not surprising. The EU has bowed down to Iran for years. He said it is “inexcusable and a disgrace” for the EU not to confront the “world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism”.

The US State Department has consistently named the Iranian regime the world’s worst state sponsor of terrorism.

The IRGC, which oversees the Basij militia, played a key role in crushing protests against the clerical regime sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini in mid-September.

The Iranian regime’s notorious morality police arrested and allegedly tortured 22-year-old Amini to death for violating the Islamic Republic’s dress code of covering her hair with a hijab.

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Question marks over the sustainability of the JCPOA revival come from quarters that were previously committed to the Iran deal. Hannah Neumann, a German environmentalist MEP, said: “How can we talk about reviving the JCPOA if the only thing that stands out is the international recognition that the regime urgently needs? The time for ambiguous politics is over. the brutal protests continue, we must not negotiate. As long as the IRGC terrorizes its own people and the region, we must treat them as terrorists.

The German Green Party has long been a zealous supporter of the JCPOA. German Green Party Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock defends the JCPOA and is now facing criticism from the opposition Christian Democratic Union party for her alleged failure to sanction the IRGC.

Fox News Digital has sent a press request to the German Foreign Office.

A huge mural of Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, painted next to a smaller one of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, right, is seen in Motahari Street on March 8, 2020 in Tehran, Tehran. Iran. The message on the wall reads: “America’s power, influence and dignity in the world are on downfall and extermination” and on top of the building another slogan reads: “We are standing until the end”.

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The UK is also considering the value of returning to the JCPOA after the regime executed a dual British-Iranian national, Alireza Akbari, in January, according to a report by the Sunday Telegraph. The newspaper wrote “UK reconsidering support for Iran nuclear deal after execution, understands the Sunday Telegraph.”

A British withdrawal from the deal would mean a serious setback to one of President Bidens’ main foreign policy goals.

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