WASHINGTON: Retired US military officers, members of Congress and former US ambassadors were among 52 US national security experts who signed a letter released on Monday urging President Donald Trump’s administration not to jeopardize the international nuclear deal with Iran.
Trump faces deadlines related to the deal starting late this week, including deciding whether to reimpose oil sanctions lifted under the 2015 agreement. He will make the decision as Iran’s government deals with protests over economic hardships and corruption.
Signers of the letter, organized by the National Coalition to Prevent an Iranian Nuclear Weapon, included Richard Lugar, a former Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Paul O’Neill, who served as Treasury secretary under Republican President George W. Bush; Michael Hayden, former director of the National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency, and Admiral Eric Olson, former commander of Special Forces.
“We support the rights of Iranian citizens to free speech and peaceful protest and we condemn the use of force against peaceful demonstrations,” the letter said.
“In responding to developments in Iran, now and in the future, the US should be careful not to take any steps that might undermine the JCPOA (nuclear agreement) which remains vital to US national security,” it said.
US security experts back Iran nuclear deal, as Trump faces deadlines
US security experts back Iran nuclear deal, as Trump faces deadlines
Bangladesh summons Myanmar envoy after border clashes
- A dozen villages in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district have been affected by the violence
DHAKA: Bangladesh on Tuesday summoned the ambassador of Myanmar after civil war gun battles in the neighboring country spilled over the border, wounding a Bangladeshi girl.
Heavy fighting in Myanmar’s Rakhine state this month has involved junta soldiers, Arakan Army fighters and Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army militia guerrillas.
Authorities said around a dozen villages in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district have been affected by the violence.
Twelve-year-old Huzaifa Afnan was struck by a bullet, while a Bangladeshi fisherman had his leg ripped off after stepping on a landmine near the frontier.
“Bangladesh reminded that the unprovoked firing towards Bangladesh is a blatant violation of international law and a hindrance to good neighborly relations,” a Foreign Ministry press statement said.
Myanmar’s ambassador to Bangladesh, U Kyaw Soe Moe, was summoned to the Foreign Ministry on Tuesday, where he expressed sincere sympathy to the injured victims and their families.
“My daughter was supposed to go to school, but she is on a ventilator,” Afnan’s father Jasim Uddin said. “My heart is bleeding for my baby girl.”
More than a million Rohingya have fled their homes in Myanmar, many after a 2017 military crackdown, and now eke out a living in sprawling refugee camps just across the border in Bangladesh.
ARSA, a Rohingya armed group formed to defend the persecuted Muslim minority, has been fighting the Myanmar military, as well as rival Arakan Army guerrillas.
On Monday, Bangladeshi border forces detained 53 ARSA fighters who had crossed the frontier.
Bangladeshi police officer Saiful Islam, commander of the local Teknaf station, said all detainees were being held in jail, except one fighter who was receiving hospital treatment for bullet wounds.
“These individuals have a history of living in the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar and crossing into Myanmar,” Islam told AFP.
