U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday says pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal will not have negative impact on his upcoming nuclear talks with North Korea.

He stressed that he would be open to negotiating new nuclear accord with Tehran.

Mr Trump told a news conference when asked if pulling out of the Iran deal would send the wrong message to Pyongyang that “I think it sends the right message.

“You know in seven years that deal will have expired and Iran is free to go ahead and create nuclear weapons.”

Trump, however, declined to say whether the U.S. would pull out of the nuclear deal before a May 12 deadline for a decision.

However, he expressed dissatisfaction with the pact, stressing “that is just not an acceptable situation. They’re not sitting back idly. They’re setting off missiles, which they say are for television purposes.

“I don’t think so, though that doesn’t mean we won’t negotiate a real agreement.”</s>US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (L) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attend a joint press conference at the Ministry of Defence in Tel Aviv on April 29, 2018. Photo: Thomas COEX / AFP

TEL AVIV – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo lashed out at Iran during a rapid tour of Middle East allies on Sunday ahead of a crucial White House decision on whether to quit the nuclear deal with Tehran.

After setting off on his first diplomatic trip only hours after being sworn in, Pompeo met with Saudi and Israeli leaders, two countries with especially close strategic bonds with the United States.

Both also have a common enemy in Iran, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly called for the nuclear deal to either be altered or scrapped, though most world powers see it as key to preventing Tehran from obtaining atomic weapons.

"Iran's ambition to dominate the Middle East remains," Pompeo said while standing next to Netanyahu after their two-hour meeting in Tel Aviv.

He reiterated that US President Donald Trump will withdraw from the nuclear deal with Iran "if we can't fix it".

Netanyahu said, "Iran is trying to gobble up one country after the other."

"Iran must be stopped," the premier said. "Its quest for nuclear bombs must be stopped. Its aggression must be stopped."

Both Netanyahu and Saudi leaders appeared delighted that Pompeo, like Trump, included their countries on his first foreign trip since taking office.

The former CIA chief and congressman showed similar affection, saying when meeting Netanyahu that he and his country were an "incredibly important partner, occupy a special place in my heart too."

Pompeo met earlier on Sunday with Saudi King Salman in Riyadh, after dinner on Saturday with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

He later flew to Jordan, wrapping up a weekend of talks with some of Iran's most fervent foes in the region.

Pompeo accused Iran of destabilising the Middle East, including through its support for Syria's President Bashar al-Assad and for Shiite rebels in Yemen.

"(Iran) supports proxy militias and terrorist groups. It is an arms dealer to the Huthi rebels in Yemen and Iran conducts cyber-hacking campaigns. And it supports the murderous Assad regime," he said at a joint press conference with Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir.

"Unlike the prior administration, we will not neglect the vast scope of Iran's terrorism."

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani said the nuclear deal was "not negotiable".

"The nuclear deal or any other subject under its pretext is not negotiable in any way," he told his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in a phone call, quoted by the presidency website.

"Iran will not accept any restrictions beyond its commitments."

Trump is due to decide on May 12 whether to reimpose sanctions on Tehran, putting in peril a landmark 2015 nuclear accord.

Britain, France and Germany all remain committed to the deal, saying it is the best way to keep Tehran from getting the bomb.

But Trump and America's Middle East allies argue the deal, approved by Trump's predecessor Barack Obama, was too weak and needs to be replaced with a more permanent arrangement and supplemented by controls on Iran's missile programme.

Jubeir said Riyadh supports "efforts aimed at improving the nuclear deal" and called for further sanctions against Iran for its "violations of international decisions on ballistic missiles, its support for terrorism and its interference in the affairs of countries in the region."

Pompeo said the nuclear deal "in its current form" does not do enough to make sure Iran never possesses atomic weapons.

Macron and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany left Washington this week after talks with Trump which failed to secure any promise to keep the deal alive.

In Washington, National Security Advisor John Bolton also said Trump was still considering his options.

"He has made no decision on the nuclear deal, whether to stay in or get out," Bolton told Fox News.</s>Washington’s new chief diplomat was to meet Saudi and Israeli leaders on Sunday to rally coordinated opposition to Tehran and brief them on President Donald Trump’s threat to end the Iran nuclear deal.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo touched down in Riyadh on Saturday shortly after Tehran-backed Huthi rebels in Yemen fired missiles across the kingdom’s border.

US officials travelling with Pompeo told reporters the Huthi missiles had been supplied by Iran, and cited the attacks as evidence that regional powers should work together.

Pompeo had dinner with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, and on Sunday he was due to meet his father King Salman.

Then he was due to fly on to Jerusalem to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then on to Amman in Jordan, wrapping up a weekend of talks with some of Iran’s most fervent foes in the region.

Trump is due to decide on May 12 whether to reimpose nuclear-related sanctions on Tehran, putting in peril the landmark 2015 nuclear accord, which most world powers see as key to preventing Tehran from getting the bomb.

But Trump and America’s Middle East allies argue the deal, approved by Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, was too weak and needs to be replaced with a more permanent arrangement and supplemented by controls on Iran’s missile program.

Pompeo set off on his first diplomatic trip within two hours of being sworn in on Thursday and on Friday — after talks with the NATO allies in Brussels — he appeared to suggest that Trump plans to nix the deal.

“Absent a substantial fix, absent overcoming the shortcomings, the flaws of the deal, he is unlikely to stay in that deal past this May,” Pompeo told reporters in at NATO headquarters.

Perhaps the last chance to fix these supposed shortcomings came from talks between Washington and its European allies Britain, France and Germany on a supplemental agreement to sanction Iran’s missile program.

But both President Emmanuel Macron of France and Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel left Washington this week after talks with Trump having failed to secure any promise that he might keep the core deal alive.

That may be music to the ears of the Saudi and Israeli leaders, who both support a tougher line on Iran.

“This administration has made it a priority to address Iran’s missile programs,” a senior US official told reporters in Riyadh, condemning the latest Huthi volley of missiles, themselves in part a response to Saudi air strikes.

“Iran supplies the missiles that the Huthis fire into Saudi Arabia, threatening civilians,” he said. “Today alone the Saudis shot down four Huthi missiles, the latest in a string of such attacks.”

Earlier, a civil defense official had said that at least one Saudi had been killed by falling shrapnel as his government’s air defense batteries attempted to intercept the missiles near the Yemen border.

A Saudi-led coalition air strike overnight Friday to Saturday killed dozens of Yemeni rebels including two commanders, state media said.

Prince Salman and his father will welcome US solidarity against Iran — just as Israel will want to see greater US support for its efforts against Iranian influence in Syria and Lebanon — but Pompeo has come with requests too.

According to US officials, while Riyadh has a right to self-defense, it must come to see that the solution to Yemen’s civil war will be a political one and its forces must not exacerbate the massive humanitarian crisis there.

Washington also wants to see an end to the Gulf crisis that has seen Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates impose a diplomatic and trade embargo on fellow US regional ally Qatar.

And, perhaps most importantly for Trump, Pompeo will urge Saudi Arabia to provide personnel and funding to help US efforts to stabilize northeastern Syria in the wake of the expected defeat of the Islamic State group.

“The president has made clear that he wants to see meaningful participation from states in the region,” another senior US official travelling with Pompeo’s party said.

“We want to see the kind of participation, for financial efforts, not just kinetic efforts that would match, parallel, would assist, the US role,” he said. The United States has more than 2,000 troops in Syria.

On Qatar, the US officials said they do not blame one side or the other, but want Riyadh and Doha to sort out the stand-off themselves.

And on Yemen, they warned the Saudi-led coalition not to again block or bomb ports that supply vital civilian aid, warning that there is no military solution to the crisis.

“The humanitarian situation in this tragic country cannot be allowed to become worse. It needs to get better. And that means full and free access to humanitarian goods, to commercial goods, to fuel,” one said.

Pompeo will conclude his first diplomatic trip on Monday after talks with senior Jordanian officials and then fly back to Washington to move in to his office in the State Department.</s>Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday revealed a cache of files he claims were obtained from Iran and prove Tehran ran a secret program to build nuclear weapons.

Iranian leaders have long said their nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes. But Netanyahu on Monday revealed tens of thousands of pages of documents, which he said were copied from a “highly secret location” in Iran and detailed an effort to build nuclear arms.

He said the evidence provided “new and conclusive proof of the secret nuclear weapons program that Iran has been hiding for years from the international community in its secret atomic archive.”

The existence of Iran’s nuclear weapons program is widely accepted fact. Revelations about that program are what marshaled international support for a tough series of sanctions against Iran, which ultimately led to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

Netanyahu’s remarks come less than two weeks before U.S. President Donald Trump must decide whether to continue suspending sanctions against Iran, or restore the penalties on one of the world’s biggest oil producers.

The Obama administration negotiated the Iran nuclear deal in 2015 along with China, France, Germany, Russia and the U.K. The accord lifted a series of sanctions against Iran in exchange for Tehran accepting limits on its nuclear program and allowing international investigators access to its facilities.

The International Atomic Energy Agency and the signatories to the agreement have repeatedly confirmed that Iran is complying with the deal as it is written.

But the Trump administration and foreign policy hawks have long argued that the accord itself is flawed. Last year, the White House announced a major policy shift aimed at working with U.S. lawmakers and European partners to toughen the nuclear deal.

In January, Trump waived sanctions against Iran, but said he would not suspend them when the next deadline arrived on May 12 unless the United States and Europe had agreed on a path forward.</s>The leaders of the U.K., Germany and France agreed this weekend that the Iran nuclear deal is the “best way” to prevent the country from becoming armed with nuclear weapons.

British Prime Minister Theresa May spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel separately on Saturday and Sunday to discuss the Iran deal as well as U.S. tariffs, according to No. 10 Downing Street. A German government spokesman also confirmed Merkel’s conversation with May, as well as her own phone call with Macron on Saturday.

“They discussed the importance of the Iran nuclear deal … as the best way of neutralising the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, agreeing that our priority as an international community remained preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon,” Downing Street said in a statement.

“They agreed that there were important elements that the deal does not cover, but which we need to address — including ballistic missiles, what happens when the deal expires and Iran’s destabilising regional activity.”

Downing Street said May, Merkel and Macron also pledged to “continue working closely” with the U.S. on the issue, including on “those issues that a new deal might cover.”

The statement comes after both Macron and Merkel visited U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington within the past week. Macron had hoped to convince Trump to stay in the deal, but said that after his conversations with the U.S. leader, it appeared likely Trump would withdraw from the Obama-era accord on May 12, when a decision is due on whether to extend a suspension of sanctions against Iran.

During his White House visit, Macron floated the possibility of a “new deal” that would complete the current accord by making its terms stricter in several areas. Trump signaled openness to the idea, without endorsing it explicitly. But the two leaders did not come to an agreement over whether to keep the current deal and seek additional concessions from Iran, or tear it up and start over again.

Newly appointed U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday, after a meeting with foreign ministers at NATO, that he was working to address Trump’s complaints about the Iran nuclear accord, and that Trump would quit the deal unless there was “a substantive fix.”

The European leaders also discussed the impact of recently imposed U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum, for which the EU received a temporary exemption, according to Downing Street.

The trio expressed “concern” about the tariffs, and said they would continue to push for a permanent exemption for the EU.</s>Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented on Monday what he claimed was proof that Iran had broken the terms of the nuclear deal signed in 2015 with major world powers.

Netanyahu said he was prepared to share the "incriminating" files with the US.

The Israeli premier claimed Israel had obtained "half a ton" of Iranian documents which proved Iran had a nuclear weapons program but had lied about it.

Iran continued to preseve and expand its nuclear weapons knowhow for future use, Netanyahu said.

"Iran planned at the highest levels to continue building nuclear weapons," Netanyahu claimed.

The Israeli leader said he had confidence that US President Donald Trump would "do the right thing" in reviewing the Iran nuclear deal.

Israel has repeatedly called for the 2015 nuclear deal to be altered or scrapped but the leaders of Germany, France and Britain have confirmed their support for it.

Iran has questioned the legitimacy of the demands for changes to the nuclear deal, saying it has respected the accord.

Both Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron were in Washington in the last week and both are believed to have raised the issue with President Trump.

In August last year, the UN nuclear watchdog gave Iran the all-clear on its stock of low-enriched uranium.

Each evening at 1830 UTC, DW's editors send out a selection of the day's hard news and quality feature journalism. You can sign up to receive it directly here.</s>May had phone calls with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel where they agreed the deal may need to be broadened to cover other areas such as ballistic missiles, what happens when the deal expires, and Iran's destabilising regional activity, the statement said.

"They committed to continue working closely together and with the U.S. on how to tackle the range of challenges that Iran poses – including those issues that a new deal might cover," the statement said.

This comes as a deadline looms next month for President Donald Trump to decide on whether to restore U.S. economic sanctions on Tehran.</s>Here’s the latest from the White House:

My, that’s quite the spectacular lie. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu did give a speech today about Iran’s nuclear program, but it was mostly just political theater. It was delivered in English and was little more than a rehash of the long-known fact that Iran had a nuclear bomb program back in the early 2000s. But it was shuttered 15 years ago—and Iran’s uranium enrichment program was shut down after they signed the 2015 nuclear deal with Obama.

I assume that either today or tomorrow some White House flak will “explain” that this whole thing was just a typo. The s key is right next to the d key! Or that an intern wrote it. Or that “nuclear weapons program” refers to filing cabinets full of old engineering papers. Or something. Who knows?

UPDATE: The White House has already quietly edited their statement to change Iran has to Iran had. It looks like “it was just a typo” has the early lead!</s>TEL AVIV (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Iran had lied about never having pursued nuclear weapons and had continued to preserve and expand its nuclear weapons knowledge even after signing a 2015 deal with global powers.

“Iran’s leaders repeatedly deny ever pursuing nuclear weapons,” said Netanyahu during a prime-time televised address carried by Israeli networks. “Tonight I’m here to tell you one thing: Iran lied.”

The Israeli leader spoke in English and showed pictures and videos purporting to be of historic secret Iranian nuclear facilities, as well as Iranian documents and plans to develop atomic weapons.

While the lion’s share of the briefing focused on what he said was past nuclear work and alleged obfuscation about it by Iran, Netanyahu asserted that such activities had continued after the 2015 deal that was meant to curb Iranian capabilities.

“After signing the nuclear deal in 2015, Iran intensified its efforts to hide its secret files,” he said. “In 2017 Iran moved its nuclear weapons files to a highly secret location in Tehran.”

Netanyahu referred to a secret Iranian nuclear project, codenamed “Amad”, which he said had been shelved in 2003, but he said work in the field had continued.

“Even after the (2015) deal, Iran continued to preserve and expand its nuclear weapons knowledge for future use,” Netanyahu said. Iran has always denied seeking nuclear weapons.

U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to withdraw from the agreement reached between Iran and global powers.

Israel has long opposed the agreement. Washington’s major European allies have urged the Trump administration not to abandon it and argue that Iran is abiding by its terms.</s>LONDON – Britain, France and Germany have agreed that the nuclear deal that US President Donald Trump has threatened to scrap remains the best way of stopping Tehran getting nuclear weapons, British Prime Minister Theresa May’s office said on Sunday.

May had phone calls with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel where they agreed the deal may need to be broadened to cover areas such as ballistic missiles, what happens when the deal expires, and what they consider Iran’s destabilizing regional activity, a statement said.

“They committed to continue working closely together and with the US on how to tackle the range of challenges that Iran poses – including those issues that a new deal might cover,” the statement said.

This comes as a deadline looms next month for Trump to decide on whether to restore US economic sanctions on Tehran - something which could destroy the 2015 agreement which lifted some sanctions in exchange for curbs on Iran’s nuclear program.

Speaking on a whistle-stop Middle East tour on Sunday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington would abandon the nuclear deal unless talks with European partners yield improvements.

“We’ve certainly made some (progress with the Europeans),” he said. “There is still work to do. They said: ‘Great, we will support you if you get the fixes’.”

Macron later spoke with President Hassan Rouhani and agreed to work with him in coming weeks to preserve the nuclear deal, his office said in a statement.

The French president also called for discussions on Iran’s ballistic missile programs, its nuclear activities beyond 2025 and the country’s role in Middle East crises, according to his office, in a conversation that lasted more than an hour.
The leaders of the United Kingdom, Germany and France agree on their support for the Iran nuclear deal as the best way to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons.