Eric Schweitzer of the German Chamber of Commerce estimates his country's bilateral trade with Iran will double within the next two years. Being the kingpin economy of Europe that means a burgeoning relationship between the wider EU and Iran.
It was notable the EU's Mogherini said last month the JCPOA "does not belong to any one country," when she met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Brussels. This was a veiled notice to the US that the Europeans intend to implement the nuclear accord with or without the Americans. Russia and China are, of course, onboard with the agreement, both having signed significant energy deals with Iran over the past year.
By contrast, Washington has signaled that it may rip up the JCPOA. President Trump has so far reluctantly gone along with the accord, which was negotiated under the previous Obama administration. Nevertheless, Trump has reportedly sidelined his Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, an ex-oil CEO, and is pushing to rescind American compliance.
Such a reversal would have legal implications since the JCPOA is an internationally binding treaty confirmed by the United Nations. What Trump's White House will seek to do is either ramp up accusations that Iran is in breach of it by testing ballistic missiles or try to antagonize Iran into rejecting the JCPOA by slapping on more bilateral sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Last week, Trump signed into law new sanctions targeting Iran, as well as Russia and North Korea.
These "secondary sanctions" -- which nominally are unrelated to the nuclear deal -- will also potentially target European banks and industries over investments in Iran.
Thus, while European businesses and governments are legally entitled to partner with Iran due to the JCPOA terms, Washington is seeking to impose obstacles on the grounds of its bilateral sanctions based on dubious allegations of Iranian links to terrorism or illicit development of ballistic missiles.
This echoes the same repercussions for Europe about new American sanctions imposed on Russia over its natural gas delivery projects to the continent. British, French, German and Austrian energy firms are threatened with American penalties because of their partnership with Russia's Gazprom in the construction of the Nord Stream-2 pipeline.
Europe's response to those American sanctions has been furious, condemning Washington's policy as blatant interference in EU energy security.
Iran is another flagrant case in point, where European economic and political interests are being dictated to by Washington.
However, increasingly it seems, the Europeans are realizing through bitter experience that Washington is not acting out of some benevolent "transatlantic unity" but rather for its own base, selfish strategic interests.
Whether it's the Paris climate agreement, the Iranian nuclear accord, or sanctions on Russian energy supplies, the Europeans are on a journey of political discovery, in which they will fully realize their so-called strategic partnership with the US is, in fact, a huge liability.
As Deutsche Welle reported earlier this month: "Europe and USA on a collision course over Iran nuclear deal."
Europe needs to extricate itself from the double think of following American sanctions against Iran and Russia, while also being penalized by Washington at almost every turn.
As the Americans famously say: "There's no such thing as allies, only interests." It's surely time for Europe to put its own interests first and forget about fictitious allies.
Not only is the American "ally" fictitious; it is also destructive and rather dangerous to be around.
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