TEHRAN – Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Thursday dismissed as “fake news” a statement by the German Foreign Office that Tehran's move in suspending cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency “eliminates any possibility of international oversight of the Iranian nuclear program.”

In a post on X, Araqhchi said Iran “remains committed to the NPT and its Safeguards Agreement” and blasted Germany for supporting Israel's unlawful attack on Iran's nuclear sites. 

Following Israel’s and the United States’ illegal attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites, the Iranian Parliament voted for a law obliging the government to suspend cooperation with the IAEA.

“In accordance with the new legislation by Majlis [parliament], sparked by the unlawful attacks against our nuclear facilities by Israel and the US, our cooperation with the IAEA will be channeled through Iran's Supreme National Security Council for obvious safety and security reasons,” َAraghchi wrote.

Under the law, inspectors from the IAEA will not be allowed to visit Iranian nuclear sites without authorization by the SNSC, the official IRNA news agency reported.

It is statement on Wednesday, the German Foreign Office also said the Iranian law “sends a devastating message.” In response, Araqchi said what “truly sends a devastating message” to the Iranians was Germany’s open support for the Israeli strikes on Iran, including on safeguarded nuclear facilities. 

Araghchi also said, “Germany’s repudiation of its commitments under the JCPOA by demanding zero uranium enrichment is a blatant attempt to undermine diplomacy.”

Israel’s war on Iran, started on June 13, caught Iran off-guard. In the first day of its strikes on the dead of the night, Israel assassinated a number of top Iranian military commanders, nuclear scientists, and struck nuclear plants in Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. On June 22, the U.S. also joined Israel by bombarding the three nuclear sites.

In Israel's unprovoked and illegal war on Iran that lasted for 12 days, at least 935 Iranians, including 140 women and children, were killed and over 5,640 others were wounded.

Iran views IAEA director Rafael Grossi as a complicit in the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, saying his politically motivated report to the IAEA Board of Governors served as pretext for the attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. In his report that led to the adoption of a resolution against Iran by the IAEA board, Grossi claimed Iran was not complying with its obligations. He even raised questions that had already been answered by Iran in the run-up to the 2015 nuclear accord, officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). 

The Iranian foreign minister lashed out at “Germany's explicit support for Israel's unlawful attack on Iran, including safeguarded nuclear sites, as ‘dirty work’ carried out on behalf of the West,” Press TV reported.

His reference was to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s endorsement of Israel’s airstrikes on Iran in an interview with the ZDF broadcaster that the attacks were “the dirty work that Israel is doing for all of us”.

“Germany also shamefully supported the unlawful US attack against Iranian nuclear facilities, which violated international law, the NPT, and the UN Charter,” Araghchi explained.

“The explicit German support for the bombing of Iran has obliterated the notion that the German regime harbors anything but malice towards Iranians.”

The Iranian foreign minister also censured Germany for its “Nazi-style” support for the Israeli genocide in Gaza. He also scolded Germany for providing materials for Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to build chemical weapons and use them against Iranian military personnel and civilians in the 1980s.

““Iranians were already put off by Germany's Nazi-style backing of Genocide in Gaza, and its support for Saddam’s war on Iran by providing materials for chemical weapons,” he said,” Aragchi asserted.