Iran Urges Trump to Change ‘Maximum Pressure’ Policy

AFP/APP

Tehran: Iran signaled an openness towards Donald Trump Saturday, calling on the president-elect to adopt new policies toward it after Washington accused Tehran of involvement in a plot to kill him.

Vice President for Strategic Affairs Mohammad Javad Zarif urged Trump to reassess the “maximum pressure” policy employed against the Islamic republic during his first term.

“Trump must show that he is not following the wrong policies of the past,” Zarif told reporters. His remarks came after the United States accused Iran of conspiring to assassinate Trump. The foreign ministry on Saturday described the American accusations as “totally unfounded.”

Tehran and Washington severed diplomatic relations shortly after the Islamic revolution in 1979. Zarif, a veteran diplomat and former foreign minister, helped seal the 2015 nuclear accord between Iran and Western powers, including the United States.

However, the deal was torpedoed in 2018 when the United States unilaterally withdrew under Trump, who later reimposed sanctions on Tehran.

In response, Iran rolled back its obligations under the deal and has since enriched uranium up to 60 percent, only 30 percent short of nuclear-grade. Tehran has repeatedly denied Western accusations that it seeks to develop a nuclear weapon.

Zarif stated that it was Trump’s political approach towards Iran that led to the surge in enrichment levels. “He must have realized that the maximum pressure policy he initiated caused Iran’s enrichment to reach 60 percent from 3.5 percent and increased its centrifuges,” he said.

‘Wrong Approaches’

“As a man of calculation, he should do the math and see what the advantages and disadvantages of this policy have been and whether he wants to continue or change this harmful policy,” Zarif added.

In December 2017, Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, moving the American embassy there the following year. Trump also recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in 1967 and later annexed. During his first term, Trump ordered the killing of revered Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani, leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ foreign operations arm, the Quds Force. Soleimani was killed in a drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020.

The Islamic republic has not recognized its arch-nemesis Israel since the U.S.-backed shah was toppled in 1979. On Thursday, foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said he hoped the president-elect’s return to power would allow Washington to “revise the wrong approaches of the past,” though he avoided mentioning Trump by name.

On Tuesday, election day in the United States, Trump told reporters he was “not looking to do damage to Iran.”

“My terms are very easy. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I’d like them to be a very successful country,” he said after casting his ballot.

Iran insists it uses nuclear technology for safe and civilian purposes. Trump’s election victory came after Iran and Israel attacked each other directly, raising fears of further regional spillover from conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon.