The Trump administration has been caught up in a sanctions frenzy in the president's final days in office, issuing restrictions against dozens of individuals and entities, ranging from Iranian officials, companies and organizations to foreign firms and businessmen in areas including mining, steelmaking and shipping, plus Iran's defence sector.
An attempt by the incoming Biden administration to rejoin the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal without first scrapping the hundreds of sanctions Washington has slapped on Tehran would be tantamount to “extortion” and must be rejected, Kamal Kharrazi, chairman of Iran's Strategic Council on Foreign Relations and advisor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has said.
The advisor suggested that “the correct path” for the US would be to first “lift all the sanctions that were imposed” against Iran “in the form of executive orders by the US president, be it nuclear-related or [those] slapped under the labels of terrorism and human rights.”
“Of course, if the United States does not return to the JCPOA at all, this is a practical step that the European signatories must follow to fulfill their commitments so that we can return to fulfilling our commitments,” Kharrazi added.
The advisor suggested that if for whatever reason the sanctions are not lifted, Iran must seek to neutralize their impact. “We have a lot of potential and…
