Federica Mogherini: Iran nuclear deal will hold

EU's top diplomat hits out at Trump's 'impulse to destroy' and insists deal is not dead.

Mogherini said she had received assurances from Iranian President Hassan Rouhani that the country would stand by the nuclear agreement | Jack Taylor/Getty Images

FLORENCE, Italy — The Iran nuclear deal can survive without the United States’ support, Federica Mogherini, the EU’s foreign policy chief, said Friday.

Speaking at a State of the Union conference, Mogherini said she has received assurances from Iranian President Hassan Rouhani that the country would stand by the agreement, despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw and reimpose sanctions on Iran earlier this week.

“We are determined to keep this deal in place,” Mogherini said, adding that only Iran has the power to unilaterally wreck the deal.

The Italian diplomat will meet with the foreign ministers of Germany, France and the United Kingdom — the three European powers that brokered the nuclear deal along with the EU, U.S., China and Russia — in Brussels Tuesday to discuss the future of the agreement. The European diplomats will also meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

Europeans are seeking to demonstrate that they can still deliver most of the economic benefits Tehran was promised in exchange for giving up its nuclear weapons program and allowing a robust system of international inspections, as well as persuade European companies active in Iran not to abandon their deals out of fear of being penalized by the U.S.

“No country is big enough to face this world alone” — Federica Mogherini

In her speech, Mogherini took several shots at Trump, though she did not mention the U.S. president by name, saying: “It seems that screaming, shouting, insulting and bullying, systematically destroying and dismantling everything that is already in place, is the mood of our times. While the secret of change — and we need change — is to put all energies not in destroying the old, but rather in building the new.

“This impulse to destroy is not leading us anywhere good,” she added. “It is not solving any of our problems.”

She also slammed the idea there could be a quick replacement for the Iran deal, which she reminded the audience took 12 years to negotiate. Global leaders have to “move on from the ‘I win, you lose’ approach,” she insisted.

Even the U.S. needs global partners, she cautioned, saying: “No country is big enough to face this world alone.”

Mogherini also praised the EU27 for overcoming six decades of differences of opinion over defense cooperation, pointing to an agreement on joint military headquarters, efforts at joint procurement and other cross-border research projects — all of which were “considered impossible just two years ago.”

The Italian diplomat touted her plans for a European Peace Facility “to give us predictability” in European defense and support global peace efforts.

“The State of our Union is as strong as Europeans want it to be,” she said, expressing regret that support for the EU among Europeans is falling in some countries. “The European Union means all of us … It is not a building in Brussels.”

If Europeans don’t invest in the EU together, it will become a “dysfunctional labyrinth,” she warned.

This article has been updated.

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