BICOM

US President Donald Trump said he is not ruling out a military confrontation with Iran given the heightened tensions between the two countries.

When asked at a press conference whether there was a risk of military confrontation with a US military presence in the area, President Trump said: “I guess you could say that always, right? I don’t want to say no, but hopefully that won’t happen. We have one of the most powerful ships in the world that is loaded up and we don’t want to do anything.”

He also said Iran should be asking the US to negotiate. “What they should be doing is calling me up, sitting down. We can make a deal, a fair deal, we just don’t want them to have nuclear weapons – not too much to ask. And we would help put them back to great shape,” he said.

Trump also accused former Secretary of State John Kerry of telling Iran not to negotiate with his administration that he claimed was a violation of the Logan Act, which bans private individuals from negotiating with foreign states.

On Wednesday Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani announced that Iran would restart elements of its nuclear programme.

The UK’s Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, said that the Iranian announcement was an “unwelcome step” adding that: “I urge Iran not to take further escalatory steps and to stand by its commitments.” The Foreign Ministers of France, Germany and the UK issued a statement yesterday that expressed “great concern” at Iran’s announcement adding that they “strongly urge Iran to continue to implement its commitments under the JCPOA in full as it has done until now and to refrain from any escalatory steps.”

Brig.-Gen. (Res.) Michael Herzog told BICOM’s podcast yesterday that he didn’t think Iran wants to exit the nuclear deal as it stands more to lose than gain. He said: “Iran wants the EU to facilitate more trade because the tool that the Europeans built to evade US sanctions, called INSTEX, is not effective enough and applies only to humanitarian assistance and medical supplies.”

Herzog added: “If Iran resumes enrichment to higher levels beyond 3.67 per cent then it will shorten its break-out time to produce enough nuclear material for a bomb, and that will raise concerns in the West and possibly elsewhere, bringing the international community and Iran back to the tensions that existed before the JCPOA. But I believe that Iran wants to avert this situation.”