The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on Iranian nuclear researchers, saying it wanted to warn young scientists to steer clear of any future effort to build a bomb.

Sanctioning 14 individuals and 17 entities, US officials acknowledged that the nuclear work was in the past but said Washington wanted to make the targeted figures "radioactive."

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Twitter called the sanctions part of the "maximum pressure campaign" on Iran as the United States tries to roll back the clerical regime's regional influence.

"We'll be relentless in denying Iran the ability to engage in WMD proliferation and all its outlaw activities," said Pompeo, who is on a Middle East tour to build a united front against Iran.

President Donald Trump last year pulled out of an international accord negotiated under his predecessor Barack Obama, under which Iran drastically scaled back its nuclear program, and instead imposed sweeping sanctions.

But European nations still back the accord and the International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly said that Iran remains in compliance.

But the US Treasury Department said it was alarmed over the continued existence of the Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research, whose Farsi acronym is SPND, saying that it could get back to work -- including after some prohibitions under the nuclear deal start running out in 2025.

A senior US official, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said that the United States wanted to "continue to stigmatize SPND and the reconstitution program-in-waiting that it represents."

The sanctions aim to "make it as unattractive as possible to be a part of that organization, make it hard to recruit the next generation of illicit nuclear weapons scientists and to make it all more clear that this is an option that is not and cannot be allowed to be made available to Iran," he said.

The sanctioned individuals include people who work with the Shahid Karimi Group, which the Treasury Department said focused on missile and explosives projects for SPND, and the Shahid Chamran Group, which researches electromagnetics and wave generation.

The US official said that the SPND was still in place and headed by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a physicist identified by US and Israeli intelligence as the aspiring father of Iran's nuclear bomb.

"It's as if some evil version of Robert Oppenheimer had been kept in charge of keeping the Manhattan Project crew together years afterward," the official said, referring to the founder of the US nuclear program in World War II.

Iran cleric accuses France of deceit, rejects rights warning
Tehran (AFP) March 22, 2019 - A senior Iranian cleric on Friday accused French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian of "deceit" on the 2015 nuclear deal and rejected a warning over human rights, news agencies reported Friday.

"The French foreign minister lies that despite America's withdrawal from the JCPOA (nuclear deal) they have made considerable efforts to preserve the nuclear agreement," Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami said at the main weekly Muslim prayers in Tehran.

"This financial channel you have made is completely deceitful," he said of the special payment system called INSTEX.

The mechanism was launched by Britain, France and Germany in late January after President Donald Trump in May 2018 abruptly quit the nuclear accord signed by Tehran and world powers.

The July 2015 accord signed in Vienna lifted sanctions in return for curbs on Iran's atomic programme.

London, Paris and Berlin said INSTEX was designed to save the deal by allowing Tehran to keep trading with European companies despite Washington reimposing sanctions.

Le Drian on Thursday called for Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh to be released and warned Tehran that its adherence to a nuclear accord does not give Iran a blank cheque on human rights.

"We have been making considerable efforts in recent months to preserve the (Iranian) nuclear accord, despite America's withdrawal," said Le Drian.

"Our wish to preserve the Vienna accord does not grant carte-blanche to Iran and certainly not in the matter of human rights," he added.

In response, Khatami accused France itself of violating human rights.

"Be ashamed, you beat up and kill your people and still speak of human rights? Do you understand human rights? You are at the forefront of violating human rights," he said, apparently referring to France's "yellow vest" protests.

Iran's spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei already on Thursday rejected INSTEX as nothing more than a "bitter joke" and said that European countries could not be trusted.

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France urges Iran to free human rights lawyer
Paris (AFP) March 21, 2019
France on Thursday called for Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh to be released and warned Tehran that its adherence to a nuclear accord does not give it a blank cheque on human rights. "We will do all we can to secure the release of Mrs Sotoudeh", French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told the upper chamber Senate. "She was condemned under astonishing conditions," for "defending the rights of women, in particular those who contest the obligation to wear the Islamic veil," he added ... read more