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first step to quit the nuclear deal.
Reportedly, the relatively modest credit line will be announced in Vienna at a meeting of the joint commission for the Iran deal—the grouping of all the remaining parties to the deal, namely Iran, France, Germany, the UK, Russia and China.
The credit line is expected to be announced on June 27, the same day Iran will break part of the JCPOA by exceeding the 300kg limit on its low-enriched uranium stockpile. On July 7, Iran set due to take a more serious step to breach the deal by upping uranium enrichment purity levels over the 3.67% limit set in the accord. There could merely be a symbolic increase to 3.68%, but if the levels continue to move up the Europeans would be anxious that the breakout time—the period it would take Iran to enrich enough uranium for a nuclear bomb—could fall below a year.
However, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said this week that Iran would never pursue a nuclear weapon because Islam prevented the country from doing so. “It is us who, because of our religious views, will never pursue a nuclear weapon,” he said.
The US is attempting to throttle the Iranian economy with sanctions to force Tehran into a broader nuclear deal, tougher on its nuclear development programme and delivering other concessions such as end to the arming of various militias across conflict zones of the Middle East.
5.1.1 current account dynamics
Iran current account, USD mn
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Balance of payments overall
-947
21,436
12,213
13,189
8,561
2,233
Current account balance
27,554
58,507
23,362
25,105
15,861
1,237
16,388
15,816
Current account balance: % of GDP
5.66
10.08
3.87
5.43
3.12
0.32
3.92
Total Exports
130,500
95,500
82,000
88,800
63,000
Total Imports
62,661
59,999
51,914
48,138
52,007
40,097
41,945
54,459
Trade Balance
68,692
42,049
32,291
35,231
20,5000
Source: CEIC, Central Bank of Iran
Iran running a current account surplus and has over $100bn of gross official reserves, says IMF
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimated in March that the government held $112bn of foreign assets and reserves. It also indicated that Iran was running a current account surplus. The figures imply that Iran might withstand the sanctions without an external payments crisis.
But the IMF also noted that Tehran was having difficulty accessing some of its reserves as its relations with foreign banks were constrained by the threat of US sanctions. Meanwhile, sanctions could cut the current account surplus sharply given the severe disruption they are causing to trade.
The IMF estimated in its World Economic Outlook released last October that Iran’s current account surplus would see a decline from 2.2% of GDP in 2017 to 1.3% in 2018 and 0.3% in 2019.
18 IRAN Country Report August 2019 www.intellinews.com