Turkey says fears ‘new conflicts’ after Trump Iran decision

Istanbul: The Turkish presidency said Tuesday it feared US President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal could open up “new conflicts”.

“The unilateral withdrawal of the United States from the nuclear deal is a decision that will cause instability and new conflicts,” said Ibrahim Kalin, spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on Twitter.

“Turkey will continue to resolutely oppose all types of nuclear arms.”

Despite calls from many of its allies, Trump announced Tuesday he was pulling the US out of the 2015 agreement.

Trump said the US would restore punitive sanctions on Tehran, after he concluded “that we cannot prevent an Iranian nuclear bomb under the decaying and rotten structure of the current agreement.”

Turkey and Iran are striving to develop pragmatic relations with each other, particularly over Syria which borders both countries, despite a long-standing, reciprocal distrust.

Agence France-Presse