PARIS — European leaders opened a diplomatic push Wednesday to salvage the Iran nuclear accord without the United States, opening direct talks with Tehran but also looking ahead to possible battles with Washington over European business ties with Iran.
“The deal is not dead,” said French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, speaking on France’s RTL radio. “There’s an American withdrawal from the deal, but the deal is still there.”
The sentiment was shared in other capitals backing the 2015 accord: Brussels, Berlin, Moscow and Beijing.
President Trump on Tuesday said the United States is withdrawing from the accord — a signature achievement of President Barack Obama’s administration that placed limits on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting international sanctions. Trump complained that the agreement did nothing to stop Iran from one day seeking nuclear weapons. The White House will now move toward reimposing sanctions.
The United States set a confrontational tone with Europe. The new U.S. ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, tweeted Tuesday, “German companies doing business in Iran should wind down operations immediately.”
[Hours into his new job, Trump’s ambassador to Germany offends his hosts]
Bruno Le Maire, France’s finance minister, fired back for the European Union. Speaking on French radio, he said the United States should not consider itself the world’s “economic policeman.”
French President Emmanuel Macron — Europe’s leading interlocutor as it sought to convince Trump of the merits of the deal — planned to speak later Wednesday with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Rouhani has ordered his diplomats to engage with their European counterparts.
But Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, suggested the country might take a harder line in the talks by seeking a “guarantee” of European support for the deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA.
“I don’t trust these three EU countries either,” Khamenei tweeted in English. “If the govt. wants to make a contract, they should ask for a guarantee, or else they will all do just as the U.S. did. If there’s not definite guarantee, the #JCPOA cannot continue.”
Federica Mogherini, the E.U. foreign policy chief, said the bloc will remain “committed to the continued full and effective implementation of the nuclear deal” as long as Iran abides by its end of the bargain. The U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has said Iran has not violated provisions of the accord.
Beyond the major policy break with Washington, however, another rift looms.
The U.S. plan to reimpose sanctions on Iran could impact European businesses and others that have moved into Iran since the deal took effect. If they defy the United States and continue to do business there, they may risk their access to the much larger U.S. market.
The German ambassador’s comment about winding down operations reverberated through European capitals.
About 120 German companies operate in Iran with their own staff, and 10,000 German companies do business with Iran, according to the German-Iranian Chamber of Commerce.
“It’s incomprehensible that the activities of German companies should still suffer” given the E.U. commitment to the accord, said Erik Schweitzer, head of the Association of German Chambers of Commerce and Industry, in a statement.
For French companies, too, the economic stakes of preserving the Iran deal are high.
In December 2016, for instance, the Airbus Group, a French aviation firm, won a contract to provide Iran’s national carrier, Iran Air, with 100 airplanes for approximately $19 billion at list prices. The U.S. aviation firm Boeing also secured a contract.
But Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters Tuesday that these “licenses will be revoked.” Boeing, as a U.S. company, must be in compliance with U.S. policy. And Airbus is subject to the U.S. license because it uses American-made parts in its aircraft.
[Boeing, Airbus to lose $39 billion in contracts because of Trump sanctions on Iran]
Perhaps no company has benefited as much from the Iran deal’s lifting of sanctions as the French oil giant Total, which signed a $2 billion deal to develop the South Pars oil field, shared between Iran and Qatar.
“Today, for Total, is a historic day, the day we come back to Iran,” Patrick Pouyanne, Total’s CEO, said at a signing ceremony in Tehran in July.
Oil prices rose more than 3 percent on Wednesday, hitting the highest levels in more than three years.
“The E.U. has repeatedly stressed that the sanctions lifting has a positive impact on trade and economic relations with Iran,” said an E.U. statement. “The E.U. stresses its commitment to ensuring that this can continue to be delivered.”
At the same time, European companies will likely respond to an ultimatum from Washington, political analysts said. Given the size of the U.S. market and the power of U.S. banks, European companies would have comparatively little leverage.
“The E.U. can take steps to mitigate the impact of the sanctions,” said Luigi Scazzieri, a research fellow at the Centre of European Reforms, a London-based think tank. “But overall, companies will be scared. They will also prioritize their businesses with the U.S.”
Luisa Beck in Berlin, Quentin Ariès in Brussels and Brian Murphy in Washington contributed to this report.
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