During the meeting, held in New York on Tuesday evening on the sidelines of the 74th annual session of the United Nations General Assembly, Rouhani expressed sorrow over the statement and urged the three European countries to meet their obligations under the 2015 nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
“We are very disappointed about the recent statement of the three European countries, which are at the same time parties to the JCPOA,” he said.
“The issuance of this baseless statement in the current sensitive and complex situation was not productive at all,” Rouhani added.
Johnson, for his part, emphasized that London was seeking to improve relations with Tehran, adding that Britain have always been and will continue to be a supporter of the JCPOA.
The leaders of Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron, and Boris Johnson, took the US line on the attacks on Saudi oil facilities, saying in a joint statement after meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, “It is clear for us that Iran bears responsibility for this attack. There is no other explanation.”
In response, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said, “The Islamic Republic of Iran strongly condemns and dismisses the irresponsible claims made by the heads of Britain, France and Germany about the attacks by the Yemeni government’s Armed Forces on the Saudi (oil) facilities, and stresses that holding a third-party government accountable for strikes that have occurred during a full-blown war between the Saudi and Yemeni parties and for which the Yemeni side has formally claimed responsibility, is per se a provocative and highly destructive measure, let alone that such a measure has been taken before any investigations, without providing any clue and proof, and has been only based upon the ridiculous justification that ‘There is no other explanation’.”
The Yemeni forces on September 14 launched drone attacks on two plants at the heart of Saudi Arabia’s oil industry, including the world’s biggest petroleum processing facility.
The attacks came in retaliation for the Saudi-led coalition’s continued aggression on the Arabian Peninsula country.
Since March 2015, Saudi Arabia and some of its Arab allies have been carrying out deadly airstrikes against the Houthi Ansarullah movement in an attempt to restore power to fugitive former president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.
