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Khamenei: Iran won’t be first to abandon nuclear deal

Despite US President Donald Trump’s threat to kill the nuclear deal, Iran’s supreme leader said that Tehran won’t abandon the deal before the other side does so.
TEHRAN, IRAN - FEBRUARY 26: Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei casts the first ballot in key elections for Parliament and the Assembly of Experts in Tehran, Iran, on February 26, 2016. Mr. Khamenei called on Iranians to vote en masse to "ruin the hopes of the enemies." The vote is essentially a referendum on the agenda of centrist President Hassan Rouhani, whose allies are trying to ease the grip of hardliners over many levers of government. (Photo by Scott Peterson/Getty Images)

In his first reaction to US President Donald Trump’s Oct. 13 speech on the new policy toward Tehran, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei slammed him for his tone, but stated that "we will not tear up the [nuclear] deal before the other party does so."

This is the first response since Trump’s speech of Iran's highest-ranking official. In his address about Tehran and the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Trump decertified the Iranian government’s adherence to the deal and called for extensive sanctions against the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Shortly afterward, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani stated that the JCPOA can’t be abolished by one certain signatory and the US Congress cannot unilaterally amend the accord as Trump instructed.

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