April 12, 2018 | Quoted by Adam Kredo - The Washington Free Beacon

Iran Threatens to Restart Nuke Enrichment Program in Matter of Days

Iranian leaders are threatening to restart the country's contested nuclear enrichment program in just a matter of days as the Trump administration and European allies scramble to address a range of flaws in the landmark nuclear accord ahead of a May deadline that could see the United States walk away from the accord, according to regional reports and administration insiders.

Mark Dubowitz, a nuclear expert who has advised the White House and Congress on the Iran issue, told the Free Beacon that Iran's latest enrichment threats expose critical flaws in the Iran deal that the Trump administration is seeking to address.

Iran's “threats confirm that the Iranian regime never gave up on its atomic weapon ambitions,” said Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based think-tank.

The nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, “merely hit the pause button temporarily on those aspects of Iran’s nuclear program that it had already perfected — and, as [Salehi's] threats underscore, could be easily restarted—while leaving Tehran with the time and space to develop technologies that it hadn't perfected such as advanced centrifuges and missiles,” Dubowitz said. “His threats reveal what many deal skeptics have long argued: unless the JCPOA is fixed, Iran has pathways to dozens of nuclear-tipped missiles capable of striking U.S. forces, U.S. allies, and eventually the U.S. homeland.”

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