US will prevent Iran from getting China, Russia arms, Pompeo says

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo yesterday vowed that Washington would prevent Iran from purchasing “Chinese tanks and Russian air defense systems” as the end to a UN arms embargo against Tehran approaches, France Inter radio reports.

According to report, Pompeo underlined that while the European Union and UN disagreed with the US decision to withdraw from the 2015 nuclear deal in 2018 and reimpose unilateral sanctions on Iran, Washington aimed to keep the world safe.

“We are going to act in a way – and we have acted in a way – that will prevent Iran from being able to purchase Chinese tanks and Russian air defense systems and resell weapons to Hezbollah to undermine the very efforts that French President Emmanuel Macron is ably trying to lead in Lebanon,” Pompeo also said.

Last August, United Nations Security Council rejected the US proposal to extend an arms embargo on Iran.

Meanwhile, the president of the UN Security Council, Indonesia, said it was “not in the position to take further action” on a US bid to trigger a return of all UN sanctions on Iran because there is no consensus in the 15-member body.

Pompeo said that his country’s European allies preferred to align with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

READ: Russia slams US assertion at UN that it remains party to Iran nuclear deal