Iranian Speaker: Shaking Geneva Deal Harmful to Western Interests

(FNA)- Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani said the fresh sanctions imposed by the US against a number of individuals and companies for violating the previous embargos against Iran will trouble the Geneva deal and inflict harm on the West’s interests.

“The West’s action creates misunderstanding and is among the US and the western countries’ immoralities; they make some agreements but don’t create conditions for their implementation,” Larijani told reporters in the Central city of Qom on Sunday.

“If anyone rocks the boat on the path of the Geneva agreement, it will not benefit the West,” he added.

Larijani underlined that Tehran expected the West to pave the way for further agreement after the Geneva deal (signed by Iran and the world powers in November), but the western side has not kept its promises to this end.

Under the interim deal reached in Geneva, Iran agreed to stop progress in parts of its nuclear program for six months in return for some $7bln in relief from western sanctions.

The United States also agreed to refrain from slapping new sanctions on Iran.

After the United States' recent punitive measures, Tehran officials have issued serious warnings that Washington is about to ruin the agreement.

Earlier today, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif deplored Washington for breaching the Geneva agreement by blacklisting a dozen companies and individuals for evading US sanctions, and said Tehran will show a well-assessed and goal-oriented reaction to any measure adopted by the world powers in violation of the deal.

“The Americans have taken improper measures in the last few days and we have given the appropriate response to them after considering all aspects of the issue,” Zarif said on Sunday.

He stressed that Tehran is seriously pursuing the Geneva negotiations with the Group 5+1 (the US, Russia, China, Britain and France plus Germany), “and we will, of course, show proper, well-assessed, targeted and smart reaction to any improper and unconstructive measure (of the opposite side even if it doesn’t violate the Geneva agreement)”.

Meantime, the foreign minister said the nuclear negotiations is moving on a rough path with many ups and downs before the attainment of the final results, "which is not something unexpected as we had foreseen this since the very first day”.