Rouhani just reminded Trump Iran can also pull out of international deals

Donald Trump would face “severe consequences” if he scrapped the international nuclear agreement with Iran, President Hassan Rouhani warned Tuesday.

“I am telling those in the White House that if they do not live up to their commitments, the Iranian government will react firmly,” Rouhani said in a speech in Tabriz, amid growing fears Trump will pull the U.S. from the 2015 deal.

“If anyone betrays the deal, they should know that they would face severe consequences.”

One retaliatory move, according to Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, would be to withdraw Iran from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty — a pact signed in 1970 to stop the spread of nuclear weapons technology.

Trump recently warned that unless the other signatories to the 2015 nuclear pact with Iran – Russia, China, Germany, Britain, and France – address what he calls “terrible flaws” in the deal by May 12, he will reinstate U.S. sanctions against Tehran, a likely death knell for the agreement.

READ: Iran’s president vows to arm the country against “invading powers”

Iran has said it will escalate its nuclear activities if the deal falls apart, and Shamkhani said Tuesday that Tehran would consider any move by the U.S. to pull out of or modify the agreement as a “collapse” of the deal.

The other signatories want to keep the deal, which curbs Iran’s nuclear enrichment program in exchange for lifting international sanctions on the Islamic regime. French President Emmanuel Macron, currently in Washington for an official state visit, is attempting to persuade Trump to stick to the deal.

Russia has warned that the Iran deal is fragile, and any attempts to change it will affect non-proliferation efforts worldwide. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday he had made an agreement with China that their countries would oppose any U.S. attempts to sabotage the Iran deal.

Cover image: Iran's President Hassan Rouhani looks on at a news conference following trilateral talks with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to discuss prospects for Syrian peace process. (Mikhail Metzel\TASS via Getty Images)