President Donald Trump has decided to withdraw the United States from a multinational nuclear agreement with Iran, saying the deal is “defective at its core” and announcing “the highest level of sanctions” against Tehran.

Under the deal signed in Vienna with six world powers – the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia, China and the European Union – Iran scaled back its uranium enrichment programme and promised not to pursue nuclear weapons.

In exchange, international sanctions were lifted, allowing it to sell its oil and gas worldwide. However, secondary US sanctions remain. United Nations inspectors have repeatedly confirmed Iran’s compliance with the deal.

Trump said the agreement – also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – was a “horrible one-sided deal that should never ever have been made”.

In response, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Tehran would bypass Washington and negotiate with the other signatories of the deal, calling the US move “unacceptable”.

Following Trump’s speech on Tuesday, there was an immediate reaction by world leaders, including the other parties to the landmark deal.

Here’s a round-up of statements from around the world:

France, Germany and UK
“France, Germany and the UK regret the US decision to leave the JCPOA,” French President Emmanuel Macron, a champion of the deal, wrote on Twitter.

“We will work collectively on a broader framework, covering nuclear activity, the post-2025 period, ballistic activity, and stability in the Middle East, notably Syria, Yemen and Iraq.”

France’s Foreign Minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, said in a radio interview “the deal is not dead”. He said Europe’s foreign leaders will meet next week with representatives from Iran to talk about the future of the JCPOA.

Germany also reiterated it also wants to uphold the deal. Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said “the deal makes the world safer”, adding that Germany could find no legitimate reason for pulling out of the deal.

On Twitter, UK Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said he regretted the US no longer taking part in the nuclear deal.

“UK remains strongly committed to the JCPoA, and will work with E3 partners and the other parties to the deal to maintain it,” he added.

Aljazeera

Two civilians have been killed and 19 others injured after Taliban militants mounted a mortar attack in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar, an official said on Wednesday.

The incident occurred in Hafiz Goddi area in Bati Kot district at round 5.30 p.m. on Tuesday. All injured were shifted to a Jalalabad hospital, a government statement said.

The Talibans have intensified attacks against security forces across the country after they launched their 2018 offensive late on April, Xinhua news agency reported.

The Afghan civilians continue to bear the brunt of armed conflicts with more than 3,430 civilians killed and over 7,000 injured in conflict-related incidents in 2017, UN figures said.

US President Donald Trump said that he would announce his decision on whether Washington will pull out of the Iran nuclear accord at 2 p.m. on Tuesday, media reports said.

“I will be announcing my decision on the Iran deal tomorrow from the White House,” he tweeted on Monday afternoon.

Trump is weighing whether to continue waiving sanctions on Iran’s energy and banking sector that were lifted as part of the 2015 agreement in exchange for curbs on Tehran’s nuclear programme, reports CNN.

Tuesday’s announcement will be the most consequential national security decision of Trump in the last 15 months since he took office as the US President.

Trump excoriated the agreement – signed among Iran and the 5+1 Group consisting of the US, Russia, China, France, the UK and Germany – even before winning the 2016 election, as the “worst deal ever” and promised to tear it up on his first day in office.

One European diplomat said it seems fairly clear that the administration will walk away from the deal, and described the chances that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as the deal is formally known, will continue intact as “very small”.

“It’s pretty obvious to me that unless something changes in the next few days, I believe the President will not waive the sanctions,” the diplomat told CNN.

“And that will have various consequences that I think we have yet fully to understand and spell out.”

The implications of a US departure from the agreement aren’t clear yet, but analysts have warned that it would send a message to other nations, particularly North Korea, about the reliability of the US as a negotiating partner.

According to the deal, which was former President Barack Obama’s signature foreign policy achievement, the West would end three decades of sanctions and isolation of Tehran that had crippled the country’s economy and fueled domestic impatience with its clerical leaders, reports The New York Times.

In return, Iran agreed to ship roughly 97 per cent of its nuclear fuel out of the country, and forgo production of nuclear fuel, even for ostensibly peaceful purposes.

In the 28 months since the arrangement went into effect, international inspectors have said they have found no violations – apart from minor infractions that were quickly rectified.

Under the deal, the restrictions on research and development in Iran’s nuclear program would begin to lift after a decade.

After 15 years, Iran would be able to produce as much fuel as it wanted – though never for the purpose of making weapons.

French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson have come to Washington in recent days to bring pressure to bear on Trump to keep the US in the accord.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has warned that the US will quickly regret it if it abandons the nuclear accord, at the same time that he reiterated his opposition to negotiating a new pact.

A deal between Saudi Arabia and the Vatican
The supposed deal would see the Saudi government help Christian worshippers
Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran has visited Saudi Arabia and met the royals this year
By Tim Stickings For Mailonline

Saudi Arabia has agreed a deal with the Vatican to build churches for Christian worshippers in the Arab country, it is claimed by Middle Eastern media.

If confirmed, the supposed agreement between Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran and Mohammed bin Abdel Karim Al-Issa of the Muslim World League would mark a historic first in Saudi history.

The cardinal has visited Saudi Arabia this year and met the royal family, urging the Muslim country to treat its citizens equally.

Under the alleged agreement the churches will be built alongside the establishment of a committee to improve relations between the two, Egypt Independent reports.

There was no immediate confirmation from the Vatican. MailOnline has approached Vatican and Saudi authorities for comment but they have not yet responded.

Saudi Arabia’s anti-extremism Etidal centre hosted Cardinal Tauran last month as the crown prince pushes for inter-religious exchange in the ultra-conservative Sunni kingdom.

There are no Christian churches in Saudi Arabia, the only country in the region without one.

The Vatican has previously spoken of its wish to provide the Christian population of Saudi Arabia with the ability to worship.

The Daily Hunt

In a welcome decision towards better inter-Korean ties, North Korea went forward in time by 30 minutes on Saturday (May 05), to match its clocks with those of the South Korea.

The “symbolic move” followed last week’s inter-Korean summit.

According to media reports, the time-resetting is the first practical step taken after the historic third north-south summit meeting to speed up the process for the North and the South to become one.

It may be recalled that Kim Jong Un had promised the move during the meeting at Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone that divides the peninsula, when he and the South’s President Moon Jae-in pledged to pursue denuclearisation and a peace treaty.

Hindusthan Samachar/Shri Ram Shaw

The leaders of Pakistan’s Shia Hazara community on Wednesday agreed to call off their protest over a recent spate of targeted killings in Quetta city following a meeting with Chief of the Army Staff Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa.

Bajwa arrived in the city late Tuesday night and held a meeting with representatives of the Hazara community that has been hit badly by the incidents of targeted killing, reports Dawn news.

According to the Inter-Serv�ices Public Relations, the meeting was also attended by Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal.

Iqbal had reached Quetta on Monday to persuade the community leaders to call off the�ir protest but they refused unless Gen Bajwa held a meeting with them.

Earlier, the Majlis Wahdatul Muslimeen (MWM) wrote a letter to Gen Bajwa, asking him to intervene to halt the killings, reports Dawn news.

The letter said the organised sectarian cleansing of Hazara people was going on in Balochistan and there was an immediate need to stop it without further delay.

Christians and members of other minority communities in the province were also becoming targets of terrorist attacks, it added.

He alleged that terrorists openly claimed that they were involved in the killing of Hazaras, but no action was not being taken.

According to the Human Rights Watch (HRW), there were four attack against the Hazaras in April.

At least 509 members of the Hazara community have been killed and 627 injured in militant attacks in Quetta over the last five years, according to a March report by Pakistan’s National Commission on Human Rights.

The roughly half million Hazara living in Balochistan were particularly vulnerable, because of their distinctive East Asian ethnic features as well as Shia religious affiliation, the HRW said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping have reached a ‘broad consensus’ during their informal summit in Wuhan, the Chinese Foreign Ministry has said in a statement released early on Monday morning.

The statement, which seemed to be a reproduction of a report in the state-owned news agency Xinhua, said the two leaders had agreed to maintain “strategic communication” at various levels and that they had the “maturity” to “properly manage and control” their differences. The informal summit between Modi and Xi has been seen as a thaw in relations between the Asian giants since the Doklam standoff.

For China, the meeting held another significance. Beijing has, in peak irony for international relations, emerged as the loudest proponent of globalisation and open trade. This unlikely thing has happened due to the rising protectionism in the West combined with the fact that these countries are the top markets for China. The Modi-Xi meet was expected to help affirm that India stands by China in its newfound role as the defender of free markets.

Here is the text of the statement put out on the Modi-Xi meeting by China’s Foreign Ministry:

“Both sides share the view that the international landscape is undergoing profound changes, the relative power of countries is heading towards greater balance, and peace and development represent an irreversible trend. One the other hand, the world is faced with rising instability and uncertainty. China and India, as celebrated civilizations, the two biggest developing countries and two emerging economies each with a population of over one billion, are important countries with strategic autonomy. A peaceful, stable and balanced relationship between China and India is an important positive factor for the stability of the world. The two countries will work together to enhance stable and balanced development of major-country relations, advance stability, development and prosperity of Asia in the 21st century, promote the rejuvenation of the oriental civilization and make a positive contribution to global peace and development.

Both sides take the view that China and India are neighbors, friends and partners. The development of both China and India is a prevailing trend of history and offers important opportunities to each other. Both China and India stand for an independent policy of peaceful development. Both sides agree that the two countries will continuously enhance mutual trust, carry forward the fine norms enshrined in the Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence, a stellar example of joint initiatives by the two countries, and blaze a broad path of friendly cooperation between two great neighboring countries, a path that can best meet the needs of the times.

Both sides agree to advance all-round cooperation and strengthen the China-India Closer Developmental Partnership in an equal-footed, mutually beneficial and sustainable manner to support their national modernization. Guided by the leaders of the two countries, they will strengthen dialogue in political, security and other areas to have full and timely communication on major issues of mutual interest to enhance understanding and expand consensus so that the China-India relationship will always keep to the right direction. They will tap into the full potential of business and investment cooperation, set new targets, harness positive forces, and explore new ways of cooperation to achieve win-win results. Building on the profound cultures of the two great oriental civilizations and harnessing the rich human resources of their combined population of 2.6 billion, the two sides will work to create a new boom in cultural exchanges by promoting people-to-people links and unleashing the vitality of the two emerging economies. For this to happen, the two sides agree to establish a high-level cultural and people-to-people exchange mechanism.

Both sides agree to properly manage and control their differences. Both sides have the maturity and wisdom to handle their differences through peaceful discussion and by respecting each other’s concerns and aspirations. They agree to use the Special Representatives’ Meeting on the Boundary Question to seek a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable settlement. The two militaries will strengthen confidence-building measures and enhance communication and cooperation to uphold border peace and tranquility.

Both sides agree to promote more active regional and international cooperation. They agree to join hands in offering innovative and sustainable solutions to global challenges such as epidemics, natural disasters, climate change and terrorism. As two major countries in Asia, China and India will use their political influence and economic power to reinvigorate regional economic development. The two countries will work together to make international relations more democratic, increase the representation and say of developing countries and emerging markets, support the multilateral trading regime, oppose protectionism and work for an open, inclusive, balanced and win-win economic globalization that benefits all.

Both sides agree to instruct their competent departments to work out specific plans and measures to implement the above consensus, and, building on the informal summit, endeavor to open new prospects in China-India relations.

Both sides agree that the leaders of the two countries will continue to maintain strategic communication in various forms.”

US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) repelled a Syrian government attack on a string of villages along the Euphrates River in the eastern Deir Az Zor province.

A statement by the Kurdish-led SDF said on Sunday its fighters mounted a counter-offensive against troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, adding they were driven “far away” from the villages they had momentarily captured earlier in the day.

Syria’s official announced on Sunday that Syrian government forces seized four villages east of the Euphrates River.

A US army statement sent to Reuters news agency confirmed the attack on SDF forces by what it called “pro-regime forces” near Deir Az Zor city, and said the “coalition used established de-confliction channels to de-escalate the situation”, without elaborating.

“The coalition remains committed to our SDF partners in the campaign to defeat Daesh [Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant] in eastern Syria,” the statement said.

US air support?
The SDF statement, however, did not specify if the US coalition partook in the military operation. US forces have established a strong presence in eastern Syria, where much of the country’s oil and gas reserves are located.

A Western diplomatic source told Reuters that US coalition fighter jets participated in the counter-offensive against the Syrian troops, which included Iran-backed militias operating in the area. This was later confirmed by an SDF source.

The SDF, led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), have assumed control of much of the territory east of the Euphrates since its recapture from ISIL.

The two sides have rarely clashed with one another as much of the attention had been directed at defeating ISIL, which dominated much of the area since it declared its caliphate in 2014.

Avoiding confrontation
The Russian-backed Syrian army has avoided direct confrontation with SDF forces in its campaign against ISIL and kept away from their areas east of the Euphrates, focusing on regaining territory from ISIL fighters west of the river.

Syrian civil war map: Who’s in control where
Earlier in February, US air strikes resulted in the death and injury of hundreds of pro-government forces, including Russian defence contractors who were advancing towards one of the largest SDF-controlled gas fields in the city of Deir Az Zor.

SDF forces accuse the Syrian government of attempting to disrupt US attempts to resume an imminent offensive against ISIL in several areas along the Euphrates River that are still under the group’s control.

US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said on Thursday his country was looking to “re-energise” efforts against ISIL fighters in eastern Syria in the coming days.

Washington has said in recent days SDF soldiers were returning to the area to launch new operations aimed at defeating the armed group.

Meanwhile, SANA reported on Sunday that a deal had been reached for the evacuation of the Palestinian refugee camp of Yarmouk, where ISIL fighters have been holed up in southern Damascus.

The transfer of “terrorist groups” to rebel-held areas of northwestern Syria would begin on Monday, said SANA, without naming ISIL. There was no confirmation from armed groups in the area.

Syrian government forces continue to launch air strikes on ISIL-held pockets in Hajar al-Aswad, one of the neighbourhoods of the besieged Palestinian refugee camp.

 

ALJAZEERA

At least 21 people, including six journalists, have been killed and dozens wounded after two explosions hit Kabul, according to Afghan health officials.

The blasts went off during rush hour on Monday morning in the Shash Darak area of the Afghan capital.

In the first explosion, a suicide bomber detonated himself close to the National Directorate of Security (NDS), the main Afghan intelligence agency, TOLO News quoted an interior ministry spokesman as saying.

In another explosion that followed 20 minutes later, a second suicide bomber targeted emergency medical workers and journalists who had arrived at the scene, Al Jazeera’s Jennifer Glasse, reporting from Kabul, said.

Glasse said six journalists who rushed to cover the aftermath of the first explosion were killed in the second blast.

A spokesperson for the Afghan health ministry said the attacks killed at least 21 people and wounded 27 others.

AFP news agency reported that its chief photographer in Kabul, Shah Marai, was among the fatalities.

An Al Jazeera photographer was also injured in the incident.
TOLO News also reported that two other journalists were wounded in the second blast.

There were fears that the death toll could rise.

“It’s a very grim morning here,” Al Jazeera’s Glasse said describing the situation in the Afghan capital.

She added that there are many fortified streets near the site of the attack.

“There’s a lot of security in that area – it’s not far from NATO headquarters – and security has been beefed up around the Afghan capital, but clearly they haven’t been able to stop these kind of attacks.”

The explosions on Monday come just a week after a blast hit a voter registration centre in Kabul, killing at least 57 people and wounding more than a hundred others.

Attacks have multiplied in recent days in advance of the long-delayed parliamentary and district council elections scheduled for October 20 this year.

“The series of attacks here in Kabul have made the Afghan capital most dangerous place in Afghanistan to be,” Al Jazeera’s Glasse said.

ALJAZEERA

Vow to work hard to resolve Rohingya crisis

After concluding their three-day visit to Bangladesh, delegation of UN Security Council diplomats, comprising representatives from the five permanent Security Council members and 10 non-permanent member states, will now leave for Myanmar soon.

They have promised to work hard to resolve a crisis involving hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims who have fled to the country to escape military-led violence in neighboring Myanmar.

The diplomats, who visited the sprawling camps and border points in Bangladesh on Sunday where about 700,000 Rohingya have taken shelter, said their visit is an opportunity to see the situation first hand. Though they warned that there are no simple solutions to the crisis, talked to some 120 refugees, including rape victims.

Hindusthan Samachar/Shri Ram Shaw