Trump Withdraws US From Iran Nuclear Deal

Trump Withdraws US From Iran Nuclear Deal.
President Donald Trump signs a Presidential Memorandum on the Iran nuclear deal from the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House, May 8, 2018.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday pulled the United States out of the 2015 international agreement aimed at restraining Iran's nuclear program, contending that it is a "disastrous" pact that won't keep Tehran from developing nuclear weapons and endangering the world.

The U.S. leader said he is reimposing the "highest levels of economic sanctions" on Iran. Trump said he was open to working with its European allies to negotiate a new deal with the Islamic Republic to curb its ballistic missile tests and military advances in Syria, Yemen, and elsewhere in the Mideast, although Tehran has already declared it is not interested in forging a new accord.

Trump, in a short address at the White House, called the agreement championed by his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, "decaying and rotten."

Watch Trump's remarks

He said it was "a giant fiction" that Iran only wants to develop its nuclear program for peaceful purposes. "The Iran promise was a lie," Trump asserted.

In abrogating the deal, Trump lived up campaign vows he made in his 2016 run to the White House. But in doing so, he also rejected pleas from three of the U.S.'s closest allies -- Britain, France and Germany -- to stay in the deal, which also included China and Russia.

"When I make promises, I keep them," Trump said.

French President Emmanuel Macron said in a tweet, "France, Germany, and the UK regret the U.S. decision to leave the JCPOA. The nuclear non-proliferation regime is at stake."

https://www.voanews.com/a/trump-iran-deal-decision/4384898.html