In recent weeks, the EU’s foreign minister Frederica Mogherini has been engaged in a campaign—traveling as far afield as Burma—to pressure the U.S. not to jettison the nuclear agreement with Iran. Current and former German, French, and British diplomats have joined in. Surveying the arguments put forth in favor of maintaining the deal, Amir Taheri finds them, to say the least, lacking:
The first [argument] is that discarding the “deal” could damage the credibility of “major powers”—that is, Britain, France, Germany, and the U.S., which signed it along with China and Russia. . . . However, the EU’s argument about “respecting signatures” [is unconvincing] because nobody signed anything. The so-called Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), [as the agreement is formally known], is no more than a press release stating a set of desirable moves by Iran and the other parties—which, incidentally, didn’t include the EU as such. Moreover, there are significant differences between the JCPOA’s English and Persian versions, making various imaginative re-readings, à la Roland Barthes or Jacques Derrida, possible. . . .
The second argument is that the deal is working and, thus, the dictum “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” applies. That assumption is not borne out by the facts. Iran and the other parties have either tried to circumvent or have brazenly broken their promises. [For instance], the Germans and the French still refuse to issue export guarantees to firms seeking trade with Iran. Huge memorandums of understanding are signed but put on the back-burner as Iran remains subject to sanctions by the United Nations, the EU, and U.S. . . .
Ironically, the only [country] that has partially complied with the deal is the U.S., including through the mafia-style smuggling of $1.7 billion in cash to Tehran and the transfer of $700 million a month since August 2015. Iran, for its part, asserts that there has been no change in its nuclear project. . . . More importantly, Iran has managed to block international inspection of key research and development centers by claiming they are military sites and thus off limits.
The good news, to Taheri, is that the Iranian economy is now so weak that Tehran might be vulnerable to additional economic pressures.
Read more on Asharq Al-Awsat: https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/1236291/amir-taheri/europe-trump-and-iran-deal