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Eurasia
August 10, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 19
Brussels tells businesses: Ignore Trump’s call not to do business with Iran
Will Conroy in Prague
If any doubt existed as to whether Europe and the US are on a collision course over Donald Trump’s plan to decimate Iran’s economy none existed by the close of August 7.
“Anyone doing business with Iran will NOT be doing business with the United States. I am asking for WORLD PEACE, nothing less!” tweeted the US president.
“We are encouraging small and medium enterprises in particular to increase business with and in Iran as part of something [that] for us is a security priority,” countered EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, insisting the member states of the 28-nation European bloc would not let the Iran nuclear deal die.
The showdown between the EU and US has been in store since Trump in early May unilaterally pulled Washington out of the multilateral accord which relieved Tehran of crippling sanctions in return for compliance with measures designed
to block its road to the possible development of
a nuclear weapon. Instead of sticking with the nuclear deal, Trump opted for a new campaign of heavy sanctions with the objective of strangling the Iranian economy to the point where Tehran would have no choice but to renegotiate its role in the conflict-torn Middle East.
On August 6—again failing to explain what specific threat Shi’ite Muslim Iran poses to world peace as things stand or why it is that he singles out the Iranians for claimed terrorist activities when analysts typically trace the origins of most terrorism perpetrated against the West in recent decades to US ally Saudi Arabia or other Sunni Muslim nations—Trump triggered the first phase of those sanctions.
Trump described the first-phase sanctions—which hit Iran’s access to dollars, gold and precious metals and Iranian industries including carmak- ing—combined with second-phase sanctions that from November 4 will target Iran’s lifeline crude oil exports, as “the most biting ever imposed”.
As well as Iran, the EU’s big three—the UK, France and Germany—and Russia and China remained signed up to the nuclear deal, saying it works and Tehran remains in full compliance with it.
During a trip to Wellington, New Zealand, on August 7, Mogherini told reporters: “We are doing our best to keep Iran in the deal, to keep Iran benefiting from the economic benefits that the agreement brings to the people of Iran, because we believe this is in the security interests of not only our region but also of the world.
“If there is one piece of international agreements on nuclear non-proliferation that is delivering, it has to be maintained.”
Mogherini said it was crucial that Iran feels economic benefits secured by the nuclear deal. She described the late 2015 agreement struck after painstaking negotiations as a “fundamental aspect of the Iranian right to have an economic advantage in exchange for what they have done so far, which is being compliant with all their nuclear-related commitments”.
The Russian foreign ministry also put out
a statement objecting to the US sanctions targeted at Tehran, reading: “We are deeply disappointed by US steps to reimpose its national sanctions against Iran. This is a clear example of Washington violating UN resolution 2231 [on the Iran deal] and international law.” The multi-party nuclear agreement had “shown its effectiveness” and the international community must “not allow