Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 14
By Ali Mustafayev – Trend:
The U.S. – Iran relations continue to deteriorate amid recent bilateral accusations and demands regarding sanctions on Iran and the country's missile tests.
Recently, Washington has announced that the U.S. President Donald Trump is considering a strategy of more aggressive policy against Iran, including against Tehran's policy in Iraq and Syria.
The possible ways of pressure on Iran include the increase of support to the anti-Assad military coalition, which also oppose Iran's interference in the country’s conflict.
“The best option is to increase the US support to the moderate forces of the anti-Assad coalition with the aim of increasing their political and military strength in the country,” Associate Professor of History and Political Relations in Sacro Cuore Cattolica University Gianluca Pastori told Trend.
He added that despite success in fight against terrorism, the U.S. is in a tricky situation, with uncertainty in sharing of its allies’ agenda and Russia and Iran supporting Assad on the other hand.
The U.S. government expressed its intention to carefully monitor the suppression of Iranian arms transfers for the Yemeni Houthis and Palestinian groups in Gaza and Sinai and to impose sanctions against the Islamic State in case of violation of the P5+1 agreement by the latter.
The Trump administration announced sanctions in July related to Iran’s development and testing of missiles, along with its support for Syria’s government and software theft. It further penalized Iran with more sanctions after Iran launched a satellite into orbit.
This policy went against the Barack Obama’s work on peaceful negotiations with Iran and the following Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
However, President Trump is unlikely to completely reverse this course, Pastori said.
“What the U.S. administration is currently trying to do is putting limits on the Iranian sphere of influence,” Pastori said.
Iran and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council – the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China and Russia – plus Germany signed the nuclear deal on July 14, 2015 and started implementing it on January 16, 2016.
The agreement limited Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for, among other things, the removal of all nuclear-related bans against the Islamic Republic and expected to have a greatly positive influence on the bilateral relations.
The steps made by Washington after Donald Trump came to power deteriorated relations and left in doubt there future development, at least during Donald Trump’s Presidency period.