The Washington Post revealed that, a week before Germany, France and Britain formally accused Iran of violating the nuclear agreement, the US administration threatened Europeans to impose 25% tariffs on European cars, if those countries refused to activate the dispute settlement mechanism.
The newspaper said that the administration of President Donald Trump threatened to impose tariffs on car imports from Europe if Britain, France and Germany do not formally accuse Iran of violating the 2015 nuclear agreement.
France, Britain and Germany announced Tuesday that they have officially activated the dispute settlement mechanism stipulated in the nuclear agreement with Iran, which amounts to a formal accusation against Tehran of violating its provisions, but Iran criticized the move.
The newspaper quoted a European official as saying that the American move - by imposing dictates on European foreign policy through fees - amounted to "blackmail".
On the one hand, Iran, accusing the Europeans of sacrificing "what remains" of the nuclear agreement for their economic interests, came in the wake of what seemed to be "blackmail" by the American President.
Foreign Minister Muhammad Javad Zarif also commented on Twitter that Paris, London and Berlin "sold the remainder of the agreement to avoid new tariffs imposed by Trump."
In a related context, President Hassan Rouhani said in a televised speech today, Thursday, that his country is now enriching uranium in greater quantities than it was before it reached the nuclear agreement with world powers.
This agreement - concluded between Iran and the Group of Five Plus One (China, the United States, France, Britain, Russia and Germany) - has been threatened with collapse since Trump withdrew from it unilaterally in 2018 and reimposed economic sanctions against Tehran that Washington has continued to tighten ever since.
In response to the US withdrawal, Tehran has since May abandoned a number of focal points in the agreement, which sharply curtails its nuclear activities.