US, UK don't 'always agree,' but must remain united against Russian, Iranian nukes: British foreign minister
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The U.K. and U.S. have remained largely aligned on support of Ukraine, but are split on other points like whether to treat Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as terrorists.
"Preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon remains an absolute priority in U.K. foreign policy," Cleverly said. "We’ve worked very, very closely with the members of the Quad, France, Germany, the United States … in imposing sanctions, and obviously we know very closely what we're doing in conjunction with the International Atomic Energy Agency to prevent Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon."
Cleverly stressed that it "will always be a U.K. foreign policy priority" to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon." He also criticized Russia, insisting that "nobody is threatening nuclear weapons use against Russia" and that "the rhetoric is only coming from Vladimir Putin himself."
He reiterated the point in an interview with Fox News Digital, labeling the dynamic an "excellent working relationship" that relies on how the two allies work through their disagreements.
Cleverly did not dwell on those differences, instead highlighting the various times that the U.S. and U.K. have pursued common interests and goals, including the response to Iraq, the recent evacuation efforts from Sudan and mutual support of Ukraine’s self-defense.
"As a P5 member of the U.N. Security Council, Russia has an enhanced responsibility to act in a reasonable manner: That's what it signed up to," Cleverly argued.
"Now, we always expect that as he finds himself under more pressure in this conflict, he will start using a rhetoric of escalating rhetoric, so this is not a particular surprise," he continued, adding that the international community has "made it absolutely clear" that not just the use but even merely talking about or threatening to use nuclear weapons is "completely unacceptable."
"We have received assurances from them that they do not intend to do so. We intend to hold them to those assurances," Cleverly said. "Russia is the clear aggressor in this instance, and arming the aggressor to perpetrate such a brutal invasion would be completely unacceptable, and whatever country has done it has really gone beyond the pale."
Cleverly noted that only the U.S. government has declared the IRGC a terrorist group, and that the U.K. continues to assess and determine "the most effective way of curtailing the IRGC and indeed the Iranian government’s malign activities."
"We, of course, keep these decisions under constant review, but the decisions that we make within the U.K. will always be based on our, you know, the primary commitment, which is to keep British nationals safe, to keep people in the region safe."
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