WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama decided on Wednesday to renew a national emergency against Iran despite peace talks aimed at ending the West’s nuclear dispute with the Islamic Republic.

“Because our relations with Iran have not yet returned to normal … I have determined that it is necessary to continue the national emergency,” said a statement issued by the president’s office in Washington.

In 1979, in response to the hostage crisis, US President Jimmy Carter declared a “state of emergency” concerning Iran. Every November since then, US presidents have routinely renewed the declaration that Iran constitutes an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US national security.

Maintaining the “state of emergency” allows the US president to impose sanctions and regulate trade with Iran.

But this year, diplomatic observers in Washington had hoped that President Obama might not renew the emergency as both Washington and Tehran seemed to be warming up to each other. Senior Iranian and Western officials are meeting in Oman this week to finalise an agreement for ending the nuclear dispute by Nov 24. The United States and its Western allies claim that Iran is developing nuclear weapons and want Tehran to halt enriching uranium beyond a certain level. Iran rejects the claim, saying that its nuclear programme was for peaceful purposes only.

Published in Dawn, November 13th , 2014