NEW YORK (Press Release)—The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations urged the U.S. House of Representatives to pass the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act (H.R. 2194) before the December break.
“The timing for this vote is especially significant. After serious attempts by the United States and other world powers to engage Iran and negotiate an end to its nuclear weapons program, Iran refused to suspend its uranium enrichment program and also announced they would suspend cooperation with the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency. Iran continues to race toward nuclear weapons capability and escalate tensions, most recently with its announcement of plans to build 10 additional uranium enrichment plants in response to the IAEA Board of Governors’ November 27 resolution calling on Iran to suspend its nuclear activities,” said Conference of Presidents Chairman Alan Solow and Executive Vice Chairman Malcolm Hoenlein.
“Should the IRPSA legislation pass the House, it has the potential to seriously impact the Iranian economy. The prospect of the sanctions in this bill and the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act, which overwhelmingly passed the House in October, are essential to pressing Iran, the leading violator of human rights and state sponsor of terrorism globally, against pursuing a nuclear weapons capacity. We thank House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Howard Berman and Ranking Member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and all the co-sponsors for introducing this bill and for moving it through the committee. We urge all the members of the House to maintain the momentum and pass the bill this month. We hope the Senate will act on the sanctions bill before it during December as well. We recognize that Congress is focused on other issues of importance, but we should not allow this critical issue that affects the security of our country and the world to be delayed,” the leaders said.
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Preceding provided by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations