MANAMA, Bahrain — A year after he struck the outlines of a nuclear deal with Iran, Secretary of State John Kerry finds himself confronting a new challenge from Tehran: While it is observing the nuclear agreement to the letter, its missile launches, arms shipments to Yemen and involvement in Syria have, if anything, accelerated.
Mr. Kerry arrived here for a meeting of the Arab states this week with the objective of reassuring them with an array of plans for new missile and cyberdefenses. Instead, he found himself disputing the argument of one leading diplomat from the United Arab Emirates that Tehran today is “as dangerous as ever.”
Without nuclear fuel or the ability to produce more, Mr. Kerry argued, Iran is far less of a threat than it was, adding that “the crisis was the potential of a nuclear weapon.”
But his hosts at a meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council echoed the concern here on Thursday that, even with the nuclear threat off the table, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps seemed to be active everywhere.