‘I Wonder How Good He Is at Understanding English’: JD Vance Responds to Iranian Accusation US Has Violated Ceasefire

Vice President JD Vance responded to Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf’s claim that the United States has already violated its ceasefire agreement with Iran while taking questions from the press before boarding Air Force Two on Wednesday.

Ghalibaf released the following statement, which appeared to threaten the integrity of the day-old ceasefire agreement, on Wednesday afternoon:

The deep historical distrust we hold toward the United States stems from its repeated violations of all forms of commitments — a pattern that has regrettably been repeated once again.

As the President of the United States has clearly stated in his Truth, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s 10-Point Proposal is a “workable basis on which to negotiate” and the main framework for these talks. However, 3 clauses of this proposal have been violated so far:

1- Non-compliance with the first clause of the 10-Point Proposal regarding the ceasefire in Lebanon — a commitment that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has also explicitly referred to and declared as “an immediate ceasefire everywhere, including Lebanon and other regions, effective immediately”;

2- The entry of an intruding drone into Iran airspace, which was destroyed in the city of Lar in Fars Province, in clear violation of the clause prohibiting any further violation of Iran airspace;

3- Denial of Iran’s right to enrichment, which was included in sixth clause of the framework.

Now, the very “workable basis on which to negotiate” has been openly and clearly violated, even before the negotiations began.

In such situation, a bilateral ceasefire or negotiations is unreasonable.

Shortly after that, a reporter asked Vance, “What do you make of him tweeting that out before negotiations?”

“So I thought it was interesting, actually, because I did see that tweet from Ghalibaf actually, just a couple of minutes ago, and let me say a few things. First of all, he said that there are a few points of disagreement before the negotiation. Well, that must mean that there’s a lot of points of agreement because there’s a 15-point plan floating around, there’s 10-point plans floating around. If he’s frustrated about three issues, that actually means that there is a lot of agreement,” replied Vance, who continued:

Point number two, to respond to each of those issues, and I read it very closely, let me just say this: I actually wonder how good he is at understanding English because there are things that he said that frankly didn’t make sense in the context of the negotiations that we’ve had. But to address the three points, first of all, he talked about an attack that allegedly happened on Iran and how that was a violation of the ceasefire. Ceasefires are always messy. An hour after the president announced the ceasefire, the Iranians launched a bunch of missiles. Then the Israelis responded.

Then some of the Gulf Arab states responded. This is the nature of a ceasefire. No ceasefire ever goes without a little bit of choppiness. What we have been very clear about is that we want to stop the bombing. We want our allies to stop the bombing, and we want the Iranian to do the same thing. We’re seeing evidence that things are going in the right direction, but it’s going to take a little time.

The second thing Ghalibaf said, which again, I found fascinating, is he said, “We refuse to give up the right to enrichment.” And I thought to myself, you know what, my wife has the right to skydive, but she doesn’t jump out of an airplane because she and I have an agreement that she’s not going to do that because I don’t want my wife jumping out of an airplane. We don’t really concern ourselves with what they claim they have the right to do. We concern ourselves what they actually do, and I think the president’s been very clear on the enrichment question. Our position on that has not changed.

I think the third thing that he said was Lebanon. And again, I actually think that is a reasonable misunderstanding, but neither us nor the Israelis said that that was going to be part of the ceasefire. Again, we’re working with people to try to get through some of these things, but it’s really, fundamentally, we’re on the right track. We got a lot more to do, we’ve got a lot more that the Iranians are going to have to accept as part of this negotiation, but I think we’ve got a strong hand and we’re going to play it well.

Watch above via Fox News.

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