Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, the US official said that the White House has a plan and tries to attract the votes of permanent and non-permanent members of the UN Security Council. The important point is that this arms embargo should be extended, he said, without noting that according to the binding UN-endorsed JCPOA, the sanctions should be lifted in October.
He went on to claim that without the embargo in place, Iran’s danger will be increased in the region as more arms would be exported to Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon.
Hook also noted that he has scheduled some meetings with officials of Western and Arab countries to pursue the issue.
The Trump administration has started efforts to extend arms embargo on Iran which will end this October. Washington has announced that it will use all its tools in the United Nations Security Council to achieve its aim. However, such a resolution is believed to be vetoed by Russia and China. As a second approach, Washington will then try to argue that it is a JCPOA participant so as to trigger the snapback mechanism which will return UN sanctions against Iran. This is while US President Donald Trump ceased his country's participation in the JCPOA in May 2018 and re-imposed unilateral sanctions on Iran.
Tehran has strongly condemned US efforts, noting that US is no longer a participant to the JCPOA since its illegal withdrawal from the deal and hence, cannot start the mechanism.
Meanwhile, Tehran, Beijing, and Moscow highlight that the arms embargo should be lifted as mentioned in the JCPOA.
MAH/FNA