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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday accused his predecessor, John Kerry, of meeting with Iranian officials during a round of talks and accusing him of trying to undermine the Trump administration's policy towards Tehran.
PHOTO: US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at a press conference at the ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting in Singapore on August 4, 2018. REUTERS / Edgar Su
"What Secretary Kerry did is unbecoming and unprecedented," Pompeo told a news conference, adding that he "should not engage in this kind of behavior. It is inconsistent with what US foreign policy is, as directed by this president. It's irrelevant. "
The Pompeo incident in Kerry comes one day after President Donald Trump accused the former secretary of state of "illegal meetings with the very hostile Iranian regime" in a late-night tweet.
Trump withdrew the United States from a nuclear deal with Iran that Kerry negotiated in 2015 between Iran and six world powers. The Trump administration has been tough on Tehran.
Kerry, in a radio interview with Fox News as part of a book tour, said that he had met with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif "three or four times" since the end from his tenure in January 2017. He also accused the Trump administration of pursuing a policy of regime change in Iran.
"He's a former Secretary of State engaged with the world's biggest sponsor of terrorism, and according to him … he was talking to them," said Pompeo, adding, "He told them to wait for this administration. to find no precedent for that in the history of the United States. "
Pompeo also denied that the administration was seeking a regime change in Iran.
Report by Lesley Wroughton and David Alexander, edited by G Crosse
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