US to Lead Security Council Talks on Iran in Late September: Haley

US President Donald Trump plans to lead a meeting of heads of state of the United Nations Security Council meeting on Iran in late September, his envoy Nikki Haley announced Tuesday.

With the United States now holding the presidency of the Security Council, Haley said the aim is to further pressure on Tehran over its alleged violations of council resolutions.

"President (Donald) Trump is very adamant that we have to start making sure that Iran is falling in line with international order," Haley told reporters.

"If you continue to look at the spread Iran has had in supporting terrorism, if you continue to look at the ballistic missile testing that they are doing, if you continue to look at the sales of weapons we see with the Huthis in Yemen—these are all violations of security council resolutions,"
she said. 

"These are all threats to the region, and these are all things that the international community needs to talk about."

During a rare public meeting on Tuesday to discuss the proposed U.S. agenda for the council, Russia’s Deputy U.N. Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy said the Iran meeting should focus on the implementation of a 2015 resolution on Iran. 

“We very much hope that there will be views voiced in connection with the U.S. withdrawal” from a 2015 international nuclear deal, Polyanskiy told the council. 

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UN Court Has No Jurisdiction in Iran Sanctions Case: US

The United States told UN judges Tuesday they had no jurisdiction to rule on Tehran's demand for them to order the suspension of debilitating nuclear-related sanctions against Iran.

Iran has argued that US President Donald Trump breached a 1955 treaty with his decision to reimpose the sanctions after withdrawing from a multilateral nuclear accord.

But US State Department lawyer Jennifer Newstead told the court in The Hague that it "lacks prima facie jurisdiction to hear Iran's claims".

But Newstead argued that the United States had the right to protect its national security and other interests.

The treaty "cannot therefore provide a basis for this court's jurisdiction" in the case, she said.

The United States and several other world powers lifted sanctions on Iran under a 2015 accord after years of diplomacy. In return, Tehran made commitments not to seek to build nuclear weapons.

Trump said the 2015 accord did not do enough to curb the threat from Iran. He pulled out of the accord in May and began reimposing sanctions this month.

In the first day of hearings at the ICJ on Monday, Iran's lawyers said the sanctions were threatening the welfare of its citizens and disrupting tens of billions of dollars' worth of business deals.

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US Presses UN Security Council to Sanction Iran

The United States urged fellow UN Security Council members Wednesday to punish Iran for "malign behavior" in the Middle East, at a meeting on implementation of the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran.

"When confronted with a country that continually violates this council's resolutions, it is imperative that we pursue meaningful consequences," said Jonathan Cohen, the US deputy ambassador to the United Nations.

"That is why we urge members of this Council to join us in the imposition of sanctions that target Iran's malign behavior in the region," he stressed.

It was the first meeting of the Security Council since US President Donald Trump announced on May 8 that the United States was withdrawing from the nuclear agreement with Tehran. 

On May 24, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) concluded for the eleventh time Tehran had met its commitments. 

In his remarks, Cohen once again accused Iran of supplying missiles to the Huthi rebels in Yemen in violation of an international arms embargo. 

In a recent report, the United Nations said that missile components fired at Saudi Arabia had been manufactured in Iran, but that UN officials were unable to determine if they had been delivered before or after the July 2016 imposition of an arms embargo on Yemen. 

"Dismantling a nuclear deal that is working would certainly not put us in a better position to discuss other issues," said EU ambassador to the UN Joao Vale de Almeida, referring to Tehran's ballistic activities and its influence in the Middle East. 

"The collapse of this major achievement would mark a serious step backwards for the region, for the non-proliferation regime but also for our security for all, which would potentially have serious consequences," said French ambassador Francois Delattre.

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Iran Sticking to Nuclear Deal: UN Watchdog

Iran is still sticking to the 2015 nuclear accord, a UN atomic watchdog report showed Thursday, four months ahead of US President Donald Trump's deadline to fix its "disastrous flaws".

The International Atomic Energy Agency document, the ninth since the deal came into force in January 2016, showed Iran complying with the accord's key parameters.

The number of centrifuges to enrich uranium was below the agreed level of 5,060, while Iran's total stockpile of low-enriched uranium "has not exceeded 300 kg", said the report seen by AFP.

Uranium when enriched to high purities can be used in a nuclear weapon. At low purities it can be used for peaceful applications such as power generation—Iran's stated aim.

The volume of heavy water, a reactor coolant, remained below the agreed maximum of 130 tonnes throughout the past three months.

Iran has inched above that ceiling twice since the accord took effect. It removed and rendered inoperable the core of the Arak reactor, which could in theory have produced weapons-grade plutonium, before the accord entered into force.

Aside from the relatively minor breach on heavy water, the IAEA reports have consistently shown Iran adhering to the deal in the two years since it took effect.

However, the future of the hard-won agreement between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany is highly uncertain.

Trump in January set a 120-day deadline for US lawmakers and European
allies to "fix" his predecessor Barack Obama's main foreign policy achievement or face a US exit. He is concerned that parts of the deal start to expire from 2026 and that
it fails to address Iran's missile programme, its regional activities or its human rights abuses.

A US exit could kill the nuclear deal, which the Islamic Republic has refused to re-negotiate. While Iran has reaped massive economic benefits from the accord, notably by being able to resume oil exports, it is still constrained by US sanctions in other areas.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has warned Europe signatories against compromising on the deal, saying it would be a "slippery slope in a very dangerous direction".

The IAEA report also said that Iran informed it in January of a decision to "construct naval nuclear propulsion in future". The IAEA has asked Tehran for further details. Press reports in the past have said that Tehran wants to develop nuclear-powered ships and/or submarines.

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