US reimposes UN sanctions on Iran amid increasing tensions

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Saturday that the U.S. will reimpose UN sanctions on Iran amid increasing tensions in the region. 

President Trump teased the sanctions earlier this week and vowed to enforce them even though the vast majority of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has rejected the United States’ authority to reimpose the sanctions.

“The United States expects all UN Member States to fully comply with their obligations to implement these measures,” Pompeo said in a statement. “In addition to the arms embargo, this includes restrictions such as the ban on Iran engaging in enrichment and reprocessing-related activities, the prohibition on ballistic missile testing and development by Iran, and sanctions on the transfer of nuclear- and missile-related technologies to Iran, among others.”

Pompeo said that if UN Member States don’t back the sanctions, the U.S. “is prepared to use our domestic authorities to impose consequences for those failures and ensure that Iran does not reap the benefits of UN-prohibited activity.”

“In the coming days, the United States will announce a range of additional measures to strengthen implementation of UN sanctions and hold violators accountable,” Pompeo added.

Other UN members have rejected the idea that the U.S. could reimpose the UN sanctions that had been lifted under the Iran Nuclear Deal, which the Trump administration withdrew from in 2018. The UNSC will likely not recognize the snapback sanctions.

Iranian ambassador to the UN, Majid Takht Ravanchi, said the sanctions were “null and void.”

“US’ illegal & false ‘deadline’ has come and gone.” Ravanchi wrote on Twitter, warning that the U.S. “swimming against int’l currents will only bring it more isolation.”

According to The Guardian Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, called the sanctions a “false claim” that will not happen. 

“The Americans claim that … within a few hours, the resolutions [sanctions] will return. But they themselves realize that this is a false claim,” Zarif reportedly said on a state television network. “The Americans as a rule act as a bully and impose sanction … The world community should decide how to act towards bullying.”