The remarks from the supreme leader reflect public discontent in Iran, where expectations of economic improvements from the lifting of sanctions have failed to materialise.
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Khamenei on Monday recommended looking inside Iran for development opportunities and ways to improve ordinary people’s lives. After six months, is there any tangible effect on the lives of the people? The U.S. has stated that some of the sanctions are related to issues not covered by the nuclear deal.
He said the sanctions were supposed to be lifted swiftly.
Iran contends that while it has fulfilled its end of the bargain, not all of the sanctions have been lifted.
He also said the United States had offered to negotiate with Iran on regional issues – the two countries share an interest in fighting the Islamic State militant group in Iraq and Syria – but that the negative experience on the nuclear deal showed that this would be like taking a “deadly poison”.
They claim the deal prevents the USA from implementing any new sanctions against their country, however, the deal only pertains to nuclear related sanctions that existed before the accord was signed. Tehran is still struggling to attract large-scale foreign investment and many multinational companies remain fearful of USA prosecution or fines for doing business with Iran.
“The nuclear deal, as an experience, once again proved the pointlessness of negotiating with the Americans, their bad promises and the need not to trust America’s promises”, Khamenei was quoted as saying by the Islamic Republic News Agency.
Under President Hassan Rouhani, oil sales for Iran have gone up, while other projected benefits that were expected to materialize under the agreement have yet to come to fruition. Unfortunately, Rouhani is not the highest authority in Iranian politics, and while he and the hard-line Supreme Leader often clash, Rouhani has only as much power over foreign policy as the Supreme Leader allows him and his government.
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“This job by Saudis is a great sin and treason but in this big wrongdoing, Americans have played a role since the Saudi government is possessed by the USA government while following and listening to Washington”.
