Iran on Monday expressed reservations about the potential results of the historic summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore, advising Kim to beware of the American president, as his credibility is "questionable."
"We want peace, stability and security to be established on the Korean Peninsula like other places in the world and we welcome any step which helps this process and the economic development and prosperity of the region," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi said Monday.
"However, given what we know from the U.S. track record and its history of behavior and relationship, especially from Mr. Trump, who in his presidency has taken steps based on sabotage, exiting agreements and breaching obligations, especially with regard to the JCPOA, we do not have an optimistic outlook toward this issue," he said, referring to Trump's May 8 decision to exit the 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
"We believe that the Korean government should deal with this issue very carefully because the nature of the American regime is not something to be optimistic about. We support peace and security that is in the interests of the peninsula, but we look at American behavior with pessimism," he cautioned, according to Iran's PressTV website.
Trump's withdrawal from the landmark nuclear pact and the threat of fresh U.S. sanctions on Iran have sent Germany, France and the U.K., the Europeans signatories to the accord, scrambling to save it.
Qassemi said negotiations between Iran and the European powers were ongoing, to see if the latter could make it worthwhile for Iran to remain part of the deal.
"If the European Union is keen that Iran stay in the JCPOA, it should fulfill in the shortest possible time its obligations regarding the necessary guarantees and mechanisms that could lead to the implementation of Europe's commitments under the JCPOA along with Russia and China," he said.
"The European Union will not have much time, and we have to take necessary measures as soon as possible in order to clarify the situation at the earliest," Qassemi added.
The statements reflected the anxiety felt in Tehran over the Singapore summit, as if it proves successful, it would show that Trump's hard-line approach vis-a-vis a nuclear state is preferable to the Obama Administration's appeasement policies and compromising the Iranian position in any future nuclear negotiations.
A successful deal with North Korea will also be a boon for Trump is a presidential bid in 2020 and may also give him the international backing to demand Iran abandon its nuclear program, as North Korea said it would, or risk military actions and the potential end of the ayatollahs' regime.
