President Donald Trump has formally transmitted the United States’ civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia to Congress, while maintaining that the deal will move forward only if Riyadh joins the Abraham Accords and establishes diplomatic relations with Israel.
A US administration official confirmed the submission to Reuters on Tuesday, marking the latest step toward implementing the nuclear agreement recently reached between Washington and the Saudi government.
According to the official, Trump has not backed away from his insistence that Saudi participation in the Abraham Accords and normalization with Israel are prerequisites for the nuclear arrangement to proceed.
Washington and Riyadh signed the civil nuclear cooperation agreement in late July as Saudi Arabia seeks to expand its civilian nuclear energy program. The agreement is expected to open significant business opportunities for American companies involved in the nuclear sector.
US officials have said the pact could benefit American manufacturers, industrial employees and domestic supply chains while providing Saudi Arabia with assistance in meeting its long-term electricity demands.
The Trump administration has also argued that the agreement would bolster nuclear safety and security, strengthen nonproliferation safeguards and make the American civilian nuclear industry more competitive. Officials have additionally presented the arrangement as one that could contribute to greater stability in the Middle East.
Trump subsequently made clear that, in his view, the nuclear agreement cannot be separated from the administration’s broader effort to bring Saudi Arabia into the Abraham Accords.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office two days after the nuclear agreement was signed, Trump said, “I just say that in order to do it, they have to be a member of the Abraham Accords, which have been very successful. But it’s time now that they do it.”
Trump argued that concerns over Iran had previously made Saudi Arabia and other countries reluctant to normalize relations with Israel, but said circumstances in the region had dramatically changed.
“They and others didn’t want to do it because of the problem that they had with Iran. You don’t have that problem anymore. You don’t have a great power there anymore,” continued the President.
Trump went on to say that Tehran’s regional power was continuing to diminish.
“You have a problem, but the problem is disappearing day by day. They were the bully of the Middle East. They were not going to be that much of a bully anymore, probably,” he said of Iran.
The president also predicted that Saudi Arabia would ultimately enter the Abraham Accords and, in turn, be able to move ahead with a civilian nuclear program that does not include uranium enrichment.
“At some point they’ll join [the Abraham Accords],” the President continued, referring to Saudi Arabia. “They’ll join, and they’ll do their civil nuclear, no enrichment, it’s civil nuclear.”
The Abraham Accords, brokered by the United States during Trump’s first term, established formal diplomatic relations between Israel and several Arab and Muslim-majority countries. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain became the first countries to sign the accords in 2020, resulting in the first normalization agreements between Israel and Arab states since Jordan established diplomatic ties with Israel in 1994.
Morocco and Sudan later joined the framework, although Sudan’s full implementation was held up by internal instability. Kazakhstan became the latest country to join the Abraham Accords in January of this year.
{Matzav.com}
