Middle East Monitor / December 25, 2020
Israel’s Ambassador to Berlin Jeremy Issacharoff confirmed on Thursday that Israel had welcomed Germany’s proposal to expand the nuclear deal, including the Iranian ballistic missile programmes, that will be discussed following the inauguration of US President-elect Joe Biden next month.
Issacharoff told Agence France-Presse that the recent call made by German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas to extend the Iranian nuclear agreement signed in 2015 is a “step in the right direction”.
US President Donald Trump, who will leave the White House next January, withdrew in 2018 from the agreement that the US, China, Russia, Germany, France and the UK concluded with Iran to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Trump considered that the agreement was insufficient in limiting the movements of Iran that aim to destabilising peace.
Meanwhile, Biden has confirmed his intention to re-join the agreement.
Tripartite partnership
Tehran has tightened its position in recent weeks, to the point that Paris, London and Berlin expressed in early December their “deep concern” over the successive installation of three groups of advanced uranium enrichment centrifuges in Iran’s Natanz plant.
On 4 December, the German foreign affairs minister called for an “additional nuclear agreement” that would prohibit the further development of nuclear weapons, as well as ballistic missiles “that threaten the entire region.”
The Israeli ambassador declared that the signatories of the agreement should take into account Iran’s “destabilising involvement” in countries such as Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and Iraq before initiating further negotiations with Tehran.
