Donald Trump has threatened to wipe out parts of Iran if the nation attacked “anything American”. The US President issued the warning after Tehran said the latest US sanctions had scuttled any chance of diplomacy, calling White House actions “mentally retarded”. Mr Trump announced on Monday he was imposing new sanctions on Iran, stepping up a policy of pressuring the nation’s leaders and further squeezing the Iranian economy.
Speaking from the White House, the US President said the new sanctions order would bar Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, and his office from access to the international financial system.
The latest sanctions come as tensions are rising between the two countries.
Declarations from Tehran that it is amassing more nuclear fuel are showing Iranian leaders are being pushed to violate terms that had been abiding by until now.
Mr Trump said: “We will continue to increase pressure on Tehran. Never can Iran have a nuclear weapon.”
READ MORE: US plans more sanctions against Iran – decision branded ‘IDIOTIC’
Iran has said it will breach the uranium enrichment limits set out in the 2015 nuclear deal on Thursday.
However, that does not imply the country is on the path to building a nuclear weapon.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif has said the country will never pursue a nuclear weapon, because Islam forbids such a move.
The foreign minister pointed to the past use of nuclear weapons by the US and to recent comments by Mr Trump that he called off a military strike on Iran because it would have killed 150 people.
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Mr Zarif said on Tuesday: “You were really worried about 150 people? How many people have you killed with a nuclear weapon?
“How many generations have you wiped out with these weapons?
“It is us who, because of our religious views, will never pursue a nuclear weapon.”
On Tuesday, Mr Trump tweeted: “The Iranian leadership doesn’t understand the words ‘nice’ or ‘compassion’, they never have.
“Sadly, the thing they do understand is strength and power, and the USA is by far the most powerful military force in the world, with $1.5tn invested over the last two years alone.”
Does Iran have nuclear weapons?
Iran is not known to currently possess weapons of mass destruction.
On ideological grounds, a religious decree known as fatwa is against any development, production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons.
However, later versions of this fatwa forbid only the “use” of nuclear weapons, but said nothing about their production.
Is Iran still enriching uranium?
Iran has announced that on June 27 it will breach the limit on its stockpile of enriched uranium that was set under a 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.
The nation’s atomic energy agency said it had quadrupled production of the material, which is used to make reactor fuel and potentially nuclear weapons.
This could potentially push its conflict with the US into a dangerous new phase, but added there was “still time” for European countries to act by protecting Iran from reinstated US sanctions.