China: Iran N-deal participants should stick to pact

Iran’s nuclear deal with six major powers should continue regardless of changes in the internal situation of participant nations, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi told Iran’s visiting foreign minister during a meeting in Beijing on Monday.
The future of the deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program has been thrown into jeopardy with US President-elect Donald Trump set to take office next month.
During his election campaign Trump vowed to scrap the pact, although the final details of his foreign policy strategy, including his stance on Iran, remain unclear.
“Maintaining the deal’s continued, comprehensive and effective implementation is the responsibility and common interest of all parties, and should not be impacted by changes in the internal situation of each country,” Wang said.
He did not name specific countries in his comments, carried on China’s Foreign Ministry website.
Iran shared China’s position, the Middle East country’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, said.
“The JCPOA is a multilateral agreement and all parties should respect it. Iran and China have the same stance on this,” he said, according to the Tasnim news agency.
“We will not let any country infringe the agreement unilaterally,” he added. “But if they do, Iran has its own options.”
The ministers also discussed greater cooperation on energy, trade and infrastructure under China’s new Silk Road initiative, the Chinese foreign ministry said.
Meanwhile, China called on India on Monday not to do anything to complicate their border dispute after a senior exiled Tibetan religious leader visited a sensitive border region controlled by India but claimed by China. 
The Karmapa Lama, Tibetan Buddhism’s third-most-senior figure who fled into exile in India in 2000, last week went to Tawang in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, in the remote eastern Himalayas.
China disputes the entire territory of Arunachal Pradesh, calling it south Tibet. Its historic town Tawang, a key site for Tibetan Buddhism, was briefly occupied by Chinese forces during a 1962 war.
Asked about the trip, Lu Kang said India was clear about China’s position on the eastern end of their border.
“We hope the Indian side can respect the relevant consensus of both sides, and not take any actions that may complicate the border issue,” Lu told a daily news briefing.
Maintaining peace and stability on the border and the healthy development of relations was in both parties interests, he added.
Leaders of Asia’s two giants pledged last year to cool their festering border dispute, which dates back to their brief 1962 border war.

Source: Arab News