Todd Bishop
Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif suddenly visited Biarritz, France, at around 2 pm on Sunday (August 25) to let Trump, who was attending the G7 summit in this coastal resort, be taken aback. When the media asked if he would meet with Zarif, he only briefly said “no comment.”
Mohammad Javad Zarif was invited by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs to “surprise” to visit Biarritz and stayed for only five hours, with French President Mark Long and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian. After meeting with the two sides and briefing the two sides, they immediately set off for Beijing to start the East Asian itinerary of China, Japan and Malaysia.
Mark Long “treats his own person with his own way”?
A few hours before Zarif arrived, Mark Long said in the French media that “we have communicated and acted to mediate differences between the various sectors”; however, Trump was subsequently asked but said: “No, we have not discussed it.” Later, Mark Long also admitted that he “has no formal G7 authorization”, but pointed out that “avoiding Iran to obtain a nuclear bomb” and “maintaining peace and stability in the region” are the two major routes agreed by G7 members.
However, Mark Long added that in addition to his speech on behalf of France, he also represented the discussion speech on Saturday night, which seemed to imply that Trump’s statement on Sunday was inconsistent with the results of the discussion at the time.
On Sunday morning, British Prime Minister Johnson was also recorded to praise Mark Long’s action the night before – “Oh my God! You did it too well last night. It is very difficult. You are doing very well.” – Outside Actually, it is not clear, but it seems that there is a correlation between Zarif’s sudden visit.
From the signs of these reversals, Mark Long is making a small bet and wants to use Trump’s fickleness to create a “German who will cure his people” and create Trump and the Osaka G20. Kim Jong-un suddenly revamped at a historic moment in the Korean-Korean border meeting. Even if Trump did not participate in the game, Mark Long’s move would have given Iran a smooth ride, so that the latter could show the world through the G7 summit’s spotlight that “Iran is isolated by the United States, but not alone”.
Iran has opened specific negotiation conditions
However, under the diplomatic and political plots under these lights, there seems to be a lot of work under the stage. Reuters quoted Iranian officials as saying that if the international community wants to show “the goodwill of resuming negotiations,” “at least let Iran’s oil exports reach 700,000 barrels a day and pay Iran in cash,” and “this is just the beginning. And then it will reach 1.5 million barrels per day.” Officials also pointed out that Iran is unwilling to include missile development issues in the negotiations.
It is worth noting that Iranian officials pointed out that this is the response of the Iranian side to the “French proposal”. It can be seen that France has always represented the European countries that support the nuclear agreement. Earlier, Reuters had quoted the news that diplomatic officials hoped that the “peaceful situation in Afghanistan after the withdrawal of the US military” would serve as the common interest of Iran and the United States in an attempt to open the negotiations, but the US side did not respond positively.
Although Trump and even any US representative did not contact Iranian representatives such as Zarif, and Trump said that “we will do our own communication, others will talk, they can of course talk,” but he pointed out that “Iran It is not the country two and a half years ago. It seems that the negotiation is not impossible. Later, US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin also said that the United States is willing to “unconditionally” negotiate with Iran.
In fact, nowadays, the United States should also push its extreme pressure-applying strategy into the “revenue” stage, seize the opportunity to return to the negotiating table with Iran, or the long-term consequences of the United States will be difficult to bear.
United States: Won the battle and lost the war?
First, the Iranian economy has now been severely suppressed by US sanctions. Its oil exports are as low as 100,000 barrels per day, a drop of nearly 95% from last year’s figures. The situation is worse than the previous President Obama’s sanctions against Iraq from 2013 to 2015. At that time, oil exports continued to be at 1.1 million barrels per day. Only about half of the figure before the sanctions.
At present, the Iranian people are “buy in stock” because of inflation expectations. Daily goods such as a shirt can double in three months, and the staff in the hospital also lack parts repair and drug shortage for medical equipment. Such problems are plagued; some researchers have even said that because of the sanctions, they can’t even subscribe to scientific journals. Although these problems are not enough to suppress the will of the Iranian people, if they return to the negotiating table, they can alleviate the dilemma. They definitely have incentives to do so.
If Trump does not seize the opportunity to relax the sanctions and return to the negotiating table, the United States will face a bigger headwind in the future. First of all, although the current trade support mechanism for trade in Iraq (INSTEX), which is used by European countries such as Britain, France and Germany to bypass the US dollar trading system, has not been effectively operated, this issue is not completely unsolved. Only if there are Russia and other energy-exporting countries that are not afraid of US sanctions are willing to join and buy Iranian oil, the power of US sanctions against Iraq will be greatly reduced. Today, this step is only a dispute between Europe and Russia on the Ukrainian issue. If this obstacle is broken, Russia’s participation in INSTEX is just around the corner.
Second, the power of US sanctions is far-reaching, relying mainly on the status of the US dollar as an international currency. However, Mark Carney, the president of the Bank of England, who was the president of the next International Monetary Fund (IMF), attended the Jackson Hole in Wyoming, USA on Friday (August 23). At the Fed’s annual meeting, it advocated a high-profile proposal to replace the international currency status of the US dollar with a multi-country-supported virtual currency. On the one hand, it avoids the risk of foreign capital flowing away from developing countries, and on the other hand, it removes hoarding dollars for countries. Trouble.
In line with new currency initiatives such as “Libra”, which is based in Switzerland, a neutral country and supported by multiple currencies, in the long run, de-dollarization is not an impossible task. The situation in which Iran is suppressed by US unilateralism and the countries have tried their best to help them will only make the process of de-dollarization more rapid and not good for the United States itself.
It can be said that the United States and Iraq are fighting for the battle between the United States and Iraq. In the long run, what is lost is a war. However, for President Trump who has asked “why not to break the hurricane with a nuclear bomb”, these long-term considerations based on “US first” do not seem to be considered.
