EU diplomat talks to US on Iran trip, Mideast plan

Monitoring Desk

WASHINGTON: Top EU diplomat Josep Borrell on Friday briefed US leaders on a trip to Iran aimed at easing tensions and discussed a US Middle East plan that he has denounced.

On his first trip to Washington since assuming his position in December, Borrell met Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and said afterward they discussed “many things.”

Asked by reporters as he exited if he spoke to Pompeo about Iran and the Middle East, Borrell replied, “Everything.”

Borrell earlier in the week visited Tehran where he met President Hassan Rouhani and voiced hope for an easing of tensions and preservation of a 2015 accord that sharply curtailed Iran’s nuclear program.

Fears of all-out war soared last month when the United States killed Iran’s most powerful general, Qassem Soleimani, in a drone strike in Iraq.

Trump in 2018 walked out of the nuclear deal negotiated under his predecessor Barack Obama and instead imposed sweeping sanctions on Iran, vowing to combat the clerical regime’s regional role.

Borrell will also meet in Washington with Trump’s son-in-law and advisor Jared Kushner, the architect of a Middle East plan unveiled last week, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the top Democrat in Congress. Borrell has criticized Trump’s long-awaited Middle East initiative, saying the Israelis and Palestinians should directly negotiate a two-state solution based on the lines before the 1967 Six-Day War.