Eye on Iran: France Looks to Fan Nuke Deal Momentum with Iran's Minister

Join UANI               Top Stories AP: "Iran's foreign minister, making the rounds of European capitals to seek benefits from a nuclear accord, is holding a string of meetings in Paris which he hopes can maintain the momentum toward change. Mohammad Javad Zarif meets Wednesday with President Francois Hollande and is paying visits to France's foreign and finance ministries. France has been a leader in reaching out to a post-sanctions Iran, announcing a bevy of potential business deals during a visit by President Hassan Rouhani soon after the international nuclear accord with Iran was implemented in January... French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault was expected to use his meeting with Zarif to push forward with the momentum from the nuclear accord. France also wants to use bilateral ties to encourage Iran into an international role, and coax Tehran out of its policy as an active supporter of Syria's Bashar Assad. Human rights issues, particularly Iran's liberal recourse to the death penalty, will be on the table with Ayrault, a diplomatic official said." http://t.uani.com/28OpM8N AP: "France's Peugeot-Citroen (PSA) announced its return to Iran on Tuesday, signing a 400-million-euro joint venture with its old partner Iran Khodro in Tehran. The first cars produced under the new venture are set to hit Iranian roads in February, with the aim of producing 200,000 vehicles a year by 2018. PSA is the first Western carmaker to announce a return to Iran since many economic sanctions were lifted in January when a landmark nuclear deal with world powers took effect. It had signed an initial deal during a visit by President Hassan Rouhani to Paris in January. 'Today is the comeback of PSA to Iran. We are very proud,' said Jean Christophe Quemard, who oversees PSA's Middle East and Africa operations. 'This company is committed to Iran and through this Iranian company we show that we are really committed for the future and ready to invest in this country.' The 50-50 joint venture will manufacture three models -- the Peugeot 208, the 2008 sport utility vehicle and 301 compact -- using parts mostly made in Iran. Some 400 million euros ($450 million) will be invested over the next five years, Quemard said at the ceremony, flanked by Iran Khodro chief executive Hashem Yekeh-Zareh. The money will go into building manufacturing capacity in Tehran, as well as research and development, PSA said in a separate statement. Yekeh-Zareh said 30 percent of the cars produced will be exported to the Middle East and beyond." http://t.uani.com/28MAQgQ AP: "Boeing Co. said Tuesday it signed an agreement with Iran Air 'expressing the airline's intent' to buy its aircraft, setting up the biggest business deal between the Islamic Republic and America since the 1979 U.S. Embassy takeover in Tehran - if it goes through. Already, one Iranian official has said the deal could involve 100 aircraft while another has suggested Iranian airlines may purchase airplanes worth $25 billion from Chicago-based Boeing, welcome news to workers on its massive assembly plants around Seattle. However, the long-standing enmity between the U.S. and Iran, as well as other sanctions and even presidential politics still could complicate any agreement - even after last year's nuclear deal... Boeing issued a statement to The Associated Press saying that it signed the Iran Air agreement 'under authorizations from the U.S. government following a determination that Iran had met its obligations under the nuclear accord reached last summer.' 'Boeing will continue to follow the lead of the U.S. government with regards to working with Iran's airlines, and any and all contracts with Iran's airlines will be contingent upon U.S. government approval,' it said... State Department spokesman John Kirby said, 'The State Department welcomes Boeing's announcement of this deal with Iran Air, which involves the type of permissible business activity envisioned in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Boeing has been in close contact with the State Department regarding this deal. We committed, as you know, to license sales of civil passenger aircraft and will continue to implement this in all of our JCPOA commitments.'" http://t.uani.com/28KwDer U.S.-Iran Relations Free Beacon: "The Obama administration is at odds over whether to give Iran access to the U.S. financial system, a move that is opposed by parts of the administration, according to communications exclusively obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. Tensions have been brewing between the State and Treasury Departments over contradictory statements about U.S. efforts to boost Iran's economy and give it unprecedented access to U.S. dollars, according to conversations with sources who described a deepening internal divide over the issue. While top administration officials had promised Congress that such access would never be granted under last summer's nuclear agreement, some in the administration have changed their tune. Secretary of State John Kerry recently participated in a public diplomacy campaign to encourage European governments and businesses to reengage with Iran, a move that was undertaken at the behest of the Iranians, who had publicly griped that the Islamic Republic was not receiving enough economic benefits as promised under the nuclear deal... Several sources both inside and outside of Congress told the Free Beacon that Treasury officials-who oversee the international sanctions regime on Iran-are upset with what they believe is the State Department's misguided diplomacy on behalf of Iran. 'It's no secret that Treasury officials are seething with anger at Secretary Kerry,' said one congressional adviser apprised of the situation. 'They say he's endangering corporations and banks because he keeps declaring that Iran is open for business and safe to enter, suggesting that the secretary doesn't quite understand how U.S. sanctions or financial crime risks work.' 'In reality Iran is a financial cesspool, and any firm that listens to Kerry is taking on enormous risk, and Treasury is running out of ways to tell him that,' the source said." http://t.uani.com/28PgLMn Sanctions Relief Daily Telegraph: "The long-awaited resumption of British Airways flights to Iran has been delayed until September. The six-weekly direct service to Tehran from London Heathrow was due to start from July 14 but has now been pushed back due to 'some technical issues'. News of the route reopening in February was greeted with enthusiasm by British travellers, with tour operators offering trips to Iran registering a surge in interest. But now those keen to travel on the airline's first direct flights to the country since 2012, when political tension was peaking following the severance of diplomatic relations with the West, will have to wait. A spokesperson for British Airways told Telegraph Travel that Tehran remains an importation destination for the airline." http://t.uani.com/28Nh3Tk Al Jazeera: "Iran and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have hammered out the technical details of a plan to build a pipeline that could transfer as much as 250,000 barrels a day of Kurdish oil to Iran, but signing off the deal has yet to happen, according to Kurdish officials. 'We [the KRG and Iran] have an understanding on how to do this [exporting KRG oil and gas to Iran]. The technical aspects have been talked about and are clear to both sides. What remains is the political and commercial side of it,' Taha Zangana, the KRG's deputy minister of natural resources, who led the talks from the KRG side, told Al Jazeera. Zangana added that a high-level Kurdish delegation is expected to visit Tehran - after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan -  to finalise and sign the deal." http://t.uani.com/28TABSw Regional Destabilization Reuters: "Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards on Tuesday condemned Bahrain's decision to revoke the citizenship of the spiritual leader of its Shi'ite Muslim majority, saying the move would encourage a rebellion in the country. 'There is no doubt that the unwise decision of the Al Khalifa (rulers of Bahrain) against the top Shi'ite cleric (Ayatollah Isa Qassim) would add to the flame of an Islamic revolution movement in Bahrain and will form a devastating rebellion against the dependent rulers of this country,' the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) said in a statement published by Fars news agency." http://t.uani.com/28OtoYI Domestic Politics AP: "Iranian state TV says the inflation rate has dropped into the single digits for the first time in decades. It quotes Vice President Mohammad Bagher Nobakht as saying Tuesday that annual inflation has dropped to 9.5 percent. Iran's inflation has been in the double digits since 1991, and in 1995 was a record-high 49.5 percent. President Hassan Rouhani's government has touted its success in managing the economy despite international sanctions, which were lifted by last year's landmark nuclear agreement with world powers. But critics attributed the drop in inflation to the low price of oil, which accounts for 35 percent of the government's annual budget." http://t.uani.com/28NpvPS Opinion & Analysis Henry Smith in Lexology: "Associate Director of Global Risk Analysis, Henry Smith, who leads Control Risks' Iran advisory services, spoke in early May at the 3rd Europe-Iran Forum in Zurich. The two-day event is arranged by a private sector organizer and attended by 450 people. The participants are government officials from Europe, Iran and the US; business people from Iranian, European and Asian corporates; professional services companies; and representatives of think tanks and lobby groups. Henry summarises five key takeaways from the event... United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) was a vocal participant at the event in Zurich, attempting to highlight to both officials and businesspeople that there are other risks for them to consider beyond sanctions. UANI highlights Iran's human rights record and relationships with designated terrorist groups as potential sources of political and reputational risk. We expect UANI to continue using direct action and public relations campaigns against governments and corporates to attempt to limit the extent of trade and investment with Iran. UANI add an additional consideration for corporations considering opportunities with Iran." http://t.uani.com/28Twjec UANI Advisory Board Member Amb. Dennis Ross in USA Today: "Ultimately, ISIL must be discredited. While we can debunk its claims by inflicting military defeats and exposing the group's actual behaviors, the United States and its non-Muslim partners in the coalition cannot discredit ISIL. Only Sunni Muslims can do that. ISIL claims it is the protector of Sunni Muslims against the non-believers and 'the rejectors' - the Shiite Muslims. If nothing else, this tells us that Iran cannot be a partner in discrediting ISIL. On the contrary, its role in the mass killing of Sunnis in Syria has contributed to the rise of ISIL. We need the Sunnis - clerics, tribes and governments - to discredit and replace ISIL on the ground. Indeed, even if we succeed in militarily rooting ISIL out of Mosul and Raqqa and removing the remnants of ISIL control over territory, Sunni governance must take the place of ISIL. If it does not, if there are revenge killings by Shiite militias in the aftermath of liberation, if Sunnis are politically and economically excluded and repressed (as was the case when al-Qaeda in Iraq was defeated in 2008), it will be only a matter of time before we see the next incarnation of ISIL. Our problem in getting Sunnis to take on this role is that our priority in Syria and Iraq is ISIL - while Iran, the Shiite militias and Syrian President Bashar Assad are the Sunni preoccupations. They see a predatory Iran using Shiite militias to dominate the region and fear we are ready to acquiesce in their dominance. Until we can show we take the Iranian threat seriously, and will work with our Sunni partners to raise the cost to Iran of its destabilizing actions, the Sunnis will be unlikely to play the role that only they can against ISIL. The next president must understand this complicated reality and use our readiness to counter Iran in the region to gain leverage and influence to move the Sunnis to make ISIL their priority as well as ours." http://t.uani.com/28Pfrcz Rep. Peter J. Roskam in USA Today: "Last Thursday night, an Airbus A300 aircraft belonging to Iran Air took off from an airfield in southwestern Iran. The commercial jet left Abadan, a logistical hub for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and headed for Syria. There is no regularly scheduled service between Abadan and Damascus, though many such flights have taken place in recent weeks and months. These planes are not ferrying tourists to and from the war-torn nation. The Iranian regime is using commercial airlines to send troops, weapons, missiles and cash to assist the Syrian dictator Bashar Assad in his slaughter of innocents; 400,000 have been killed so far. Iran Air was sanctioned by the Treasury Department for this exact reason in 2011. It was only delisted in January as a concession in the nuclear deal. Since that deal Iran has not changed its behavior, though some Western companies have. In January, European airplane manufacturer Airbus reached a preliminary deal to sell planes to Iran Air. It did not take long for Boeing to follow suit. I have been closely following these companies' ongoing negotiations with the Iranian regime over the past few months. I have urged them both, privately and publicly, not to weaponize the mullahs. Boeing says it must go wherever Airbus goes. But history is a merciless disciplinarian to those who make themselves complicit in evil because 'someone else was doing it.' The Islamic Republic of Iran is the world's foremost state sponsor of terrorism. It systematically uses commercial aircraft to sow the seeds of death and destruction around the globe. Iran's terror proxies have killed and wounded thousands of Americans troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. They've murdered civilians from Beirut to Buenos Aires. The Boeing Co. is an iconic American brand, the global leader in aerospace and aviation technology. The company creates thousands of jobs in my home state of Illinois and re­inforces Chicago's standing as a leading hub for technology and innovation. But the decision to sell militarily-fungible products to terrorism's central supplier is just plain wrong. I will do everything in my power to stop it." http://t.uani.com/28Ou0NW Emanuele Ottolenghi in The Hill: "Boeing's potential deal to sell aircraft to Iran may have benefits for the company's ledger and for the U.S. banks that will finance it. But the deal is also fraught with danger, including the possibility that the aircraft may one day become a tool for Iran's ongoing support for atrocities and war crimes in Syria. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) removed U.S. sanctions against Iran's aviation sector, only forbidding sales of aircraft, spare parts and services to five airlines implicated in Iran's ongoing airlift to the regime of Bashar Assad in Syria and Iran's proxy, Hezbollah. The U.S. Treasury Department issued a general license for aircraft sales to Iran last March, and the JCPOA now permits U.S. banks to finance this transaction. As long as the five sanctioned airlines do not benefit from the deal, Washington is permitting Boeing to sell to Iran. But how can we be sure they won't? Iran wants to buy up to 500 aircraft over the next decade to rejuvenate its aging fleet, and Boeing is reportedly in line to sell Tehran 100 of them. This comes on the heels of a multibillion dollar deal with Airbus to purchase 118 aircraft, a deal with ATR to buy 40 regional planes and other deals in the works with Bombardier and Embraer. A key issue remains: How will the deal be financed? In the Airbus and ATR cases, European banks and the export credit government agencies of Italy and France will finance the deal, rather than have Iran pay for the aircraft upfront. With Boeing, it will be more complicated, but possible, since the Obama administration is keen to smooth the way. Dollarized transactions with Iran were previously forbidden. The rare exceptions - usually carpets and foodstuff - required a license from the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). But the aircraft deals are now technically legal, and, given its aging commercial fleet, Iran certainly needs new aircraft for legitimate transportation. But it cannot be ignored that Tehran also needs these aircraft to run an illicit operation airlifting weapons and militias from its airports in Tehran and Abadan to Syria. Iran's military airlift to Syria began in 2011, shortly after Syria's Arab spring degenerated into a full-fledged civil war. With Assad's regime on the defensive and America and its allies reluctant to jeopardize the nuclear deal over Syria, the tempo of Iran's airlifts dramatically increased in August 2015, from weekly to daily flights... Presumably, the Boeing deal will seek to ensure that sold aircraft are not used for this lamentable business. Iran's state-owned airline, Iran Air, will be the sole company purchasing these aircraft. Treasury sanctioned Iran Air in 2011 for its role in Iran's weapons airlift to Syria, but its aircraft mostly has not operated the Iran-Syria route since the JCPOA was concluded. The company was delisted under the JCPOA in January. Regardless, Iran Air planes recently flew known weapons resupply routes to Syria - on June 9 from Abadan while using the Tehran-Damascus flight number, and on June 8 and 15 from Tehran while using the now-defunct Najaf-Tehran flight number. Should it be proven that Iran Air is once again carrying weapons, supplies or forces for the Syrian regime, the airline risks getting slapped with renewed sanctions and Boeing risks having its planes aiding the brutality of the Assad regime." http://t.uani.com/28PKenr         Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) a program of the American Coalition Against Nuclear Iran, Inc., a tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Eye on Iran is not intended as a comprehensive media clips summary but rather a selection of media elements with discreet analysis in a PDA friendly format. For more information please email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a non-partisan, broad-based coalition that is united in a commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons.  UANI is an issue-based coalition in which each coalition member will have its own interests as well as the collective goal of advancing an Iran free of nuclear weapons.