US President Donald Trump abandoned the nuclear pact with Iran last year because it was signed by his predecessor, Barack Obama, according to the latest UK diplomatic cables published in a British newspaper.
The e-mails, reportedly from Kim Darroch, who was Britain’s ambassador to the US until he quit last week following the first batch of leaks, center on then-British secretary of state for foreign and commonwealth affairs Boris Johnson’s last-ditch visit to Washington in May last year.
Johnson, now closing in on the British prime minister’s position, tried in vain to get Trump to stick with the nuclear deal.
Photo: AFP
According to the Mail on Sunday, the leaked e-mails suggested US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo showed signs he disagreed with Trump’s position.
Darroch also described how Trump’s advisers were at a loss to explain why the president was so determined to scrap the deal and they had no idea what to do next.
“The outcome illustrated the paradox of this White House: You got exceptional access, seeing everyone short of the president; but on the substance, the administration is set upon an act of diplomatic vandalism, seemingly for ideological and personality reasons — it was Obama’s deal,” Darroch concluded in a cable sent after the Johnson meetings and leaked to the Mail.
The initial controversy over the diplomat’s cabled comments, in which he criticizing the Trump administration as “inept” and “dysfunctional,” developed into a key element of the latest jousting between Johnson and British Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Jeremy Hunt for the Tory crown.
It escalated further on Saturday and even united the contenders after the Metropolitan Police issued a statement on Friday warning journalists to hand over any state secrets.
The Met backtracked on Saturday, saying the police had “no intention of seeking to prevent editors from publishing stories in the public interest in a liberal democracy,” but warning that any breach of the Official Secrets Act would constitute a criminal offense.
The act bars public servants from making “damaging” disclosures of classified material; contravening the act carries a maximum sentence of two years in prison, though prosecutions are rare.
According to the Sunday Times, authorities have identified the person responsible for leaking the documents to the Mail.
The suspect had access to historical Foreign Office files, which would rule out a computer hacker being responsible, according to the Times.
The Mail’s July 7 report, which quoted Darroch describing Trump’s White House as “uniquely dysfunctional” and given to “knife fights,” enraged the president and ultimately cost Darroch his job.
Additional reporting by AFP
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