Trump administration officials, briefing reporters on Monday on the decision, said new economic sanctions against Iran were being prepared over its ballistic missile program and for contributing to regional tensions. A senior administration official said Iran was judged in compliance of the 2015 nuclear deal but that Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson believed Iran “remains one of the most dangerous threats to US interests and to regional stability”. The UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, concluded in December 2015, however, that Iran worked on the design of a missile-borne nuclear warhead until 2009. The senior administration official said the Trump administration intended to employ a strategy that would “address the totality of Iran’s malign behavior” and not just focus on the Iran nuclear agreement. The administration is also looking at ways to strengthen the nuclear deal and more strictly enforce it, the official said, citing concerns that the deal over time would let Iran openly pursue industrial-scale nuclear fuel enrichment.

Source: Dhaka Tribune July 18, 2017 03:22 UTC