BICOM

The Trump administration will review whether the lifting of sanctions against Iran is in the United States’ national security interests.

In a letter to House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that Iran remained compliant with the 2015 nuclear deal agreed by the Obama administration, but highlighted concerns that the Islamic Republic is a state sponsor of terrorism.

Under the Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the State Department must update Congress on Iran’s compliance every 90 days.  This is the first time this has happened since Donald Trump took office.

Announcing the decision, Tillerson said: “President Donald J. Trump has directed a National Security Council-led interagency review of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that will evaluate whether suspension of sanctions related to Iran pursuant to the JCPOA is vital to the national security interests of the United States.”

No further detail was announced as to how long the review would take, its terms of reference and who exactly would be involved.

Under the terms of the JCPOA, Iran agreed to cease its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions that prohibited oil sales and imposed financial sanctions. Iran is required to reduce centrifuges by two-thirds, cap its level of uranium enrichment to well below the level needed for bomb-grade material, reduce its enriched uranium stockpile from 10,000 kg to 300 kg for 15 years, and submit to international inspections to verify its compliance.

The review was announced by Rex Tillerson on Tuesday and coincided with Defence Secretary James Mattis’s arrival in Saudi Arabia at the start of an extensive visit to the Middle East that will include meetings in Egypt, Qatar and Israel. Last month, Mattis warned that Iran continues to behave as an exporter of terrorism.

The US has long accused Iran of being the world’s biggest state sponsor of terrorism, supporting conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, as well as heavily backing Hezbollah in Lebanon.

In February Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu discussed the Iranian threat with President Trump.  Netanyahu told the US President that Iran is “the greatest generator of terrorism in the world” and that they needed to “fight this terror” because it is just “one arm of Iranian aggression, which also seeks nuclear weapons and advances its ballistic missiles programme”.