Britain warns of fresh Middle East conflict over alleged Iran nuclear program

LONDON - Britain on Tuesday warned of the danger of a fresh conflict exploding in the Middle East after Israel unveiled a dossier claiming to be evidence of a secret Iranian nuclear weapons program.

The British Foreign Office urged all countries in the region to consider the impact of the "logical consequence of your next step" amid escalating tensions.

Britain, together with France and Germany, is backing the nuclear deal struck between Iran and the three European nations, the United States, Russia and China, in 2015.

US President Donald Trump vowed to pull America out of the Iran deal during his presidential campaign. The move by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to publish the report on alleged Iranian nuclear activity may increase pressure on Washington to turn its back on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) deal.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the information showed Iran's leaders lied to their people about a nuclear weapons program known as "Project Amad".

But the Israeli prime minister declined to say whether the documents provided evidence of a violation of the nuclear deal.

British Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt said that Britain understood Israel's "anxiety" about Iran's nuclear ambitions. But he said that the Israeli prime minister's intervention made the case for a "verifiable agreement where Iran has reduced its uranium stockpile by 95 percent, its centrifuges by two thirds and has been as recently as February adjudged by the International Atomic Energy Agency to be in compliance with the JCPOA."

"The worry is the heightened tension in the region... one of the roles the UK can play is to seek to de-escalate this rhetoric, to say: 'What is the logical consequence of your next step -- strikes here, strikes there, what happens if something goes wrong'," Burt said.

In Tehran, the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman, Bahram Ghasemi, condemned Netanyahu's presentation as a "propaganda show" that offered nothing but "a pack of lies."

Ghasemi said the claims were worn-out, useless and shameful, according to the foreign ministry. Netanyahu's remarks were those of a "broke and infamous liar who has had nothing to offer except lies and deceits," an Iranian foreign ministry statement said.