Iran says US move to extend arms' embargo 'unlawful'

TEHRAN - Iran's envoy to the United Nations said the US call for the extension of a UN arms embargo on Iran lacks a legal standing and it will be turned down at the UN Security Council, state TV reported on Saturday.

The world's countries "will not accept to be a partner in the Americans' very ugly measure that runs against international law," Majid Takht-Ravanchi made the remarks on Friday after Washington drafted a resolution to indefinitely prolong the arms embargo on Iran.

"That the United States wants to say it is a member of the JCPOA (the Iranian 2015 nuclear deal) and use the path of UN Security Council Resolution 2231 (which has endorsed the 2015 multilateral nuclear deal) is similar to a joke," Takht-Ravanchi was quoted as saying.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday that Washington was considering "every possibility" to renew the ban on selling conventional arms to Iran.

"We're not going to let that happen," he said, adding that the US administration is urging the three European signatories to the JCPOA "to take action which is within their capacity today."

The United States will urge the UN Security Council to extend JCPOA-endorsed arms embargo on Iran which ends in six months' time, he added.

Takht-Ravanchi said that by withdrawing from the Iranian nuclear deal in 2018, the United States has violated both Resolution 2231 and its commitments stipulated under the JCPOA.

"What the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and some other US officials said ... have no legal standing in international law," Takht-Ravanchi stressed.