Mehdi Safari, deputy foreign minister for European affairs, recently said that Europe is missing opportunities to cooperate with Iran while the strategic importance of Middle East and especially Iran, as a lucrative market is on the rise.
Until the recent past, Europe was viewed as Iran’s top trading partner, but now that has changed as Asia takes its place without the shackles of colonialism, arrogance, greed or lowly cultures.
Although ties between Iran and Europe date back centuries and Iran is among the first powers to have broadened ties with the European Union (EU), two-way interaction has after the 1979 Islamic Revolution era had more than its share of ups and downs.
Experts on both sides concur that Tehran and Brussels need strong bilateral bonds. However, extended absence of a free and independent EU foreign policy and key
European powers perpetually siding with America (including on highly sensitive and controversial issues) have created conditions wherein the long normal ties have been sacrificed at the altar of political profit.
From the mid-1990s when Washington tightened its unilateral sanctions against Iran,
European companies replaced American firms in Iran’s development projects. In the meantime, the strong EU opposition to the US embargo resulted in the gradual expansion of Iran-EU ties obviously in the interest of both sides.
However, after a while some quarters in Brussels decided to give a political slant to the relations with the Islamic state. In the process, they attempted to draw heavily on economic factors for exerting political pressure on Tehran. Such unacceptable policy and pressure compelled Iran in the late 1990s to change course and look East.
As time passed Asian companies saw the new economic opening and started to replace the Europeans in Iran’s major economic sectors, energy in particular.
When the nuclear issue emerged, reality struck and EU weakness in decision-making became all the more apparent. In recent years, whenever experts expressed guarded optimism that nuclear talks with the EU would produce positive results, their hope turned into fantasy as most negotiations ended in stalemate, due primarily to the destructive US interference.
With Britain, France and Germany rushing into the Bush enclave over the dispute, EU weakness, vulnerability and lack of vision became an open secret for the free peoples of the world.
Since American companies were barred from participating in Iranian projects due to sanctions, Washington went out of its way to ensure that European enterprises were also kept far away from the Iranian market. It is amply clear that the US does not want the EU to become a self-reliant powerhouse when it comes to resolving major international problems. No wonder it continues to place hurdles in the way of finding a mutually acceptable solution to the nuclear case.
The systemic absence of EU self-determination in international relations has given Tehran all the more reason to work closely with Asia. Today the informed Iranian more than ever mistrusts Europe. Rulers and the ruled in Iran had expected that at the least the European powers defend Iran’s inalienable right to acquire civilian nuclear technology. But with last week’s sanction against Bank Melli of Iran (BMI) the EU once again demonstrated that when it comes to the Middle East and Iran they prefer to stand behind their American cousins.
Iran’s Ambassador in Paris Ali Ahani recently said that the EU decision to blacklist the BMI speaks volumes. The European side with the all the rhetoric simply lacks good intent, he was quoted as saying.
With Europe making haste in banning the most important and influential Iranian bank, Asian banks will soon step in and do the needful without much hassle. Furthermore, Iranian assets/holdings in Europe will be either transferred back to Iran or moved to Asian banks. Economic and financial sanctions are being imposed on Iran even though
European companies and industries seek expansion in two-way collaboration.
In view of Iran’s declared intent to diversify trade and economic ties, Asian firms will be a suitable substitute for their European counterparts now in the process of fading away from the Iranian economic landscape. Asians normally operate without strings attached and avoid using (abusing) economic relations as a tool to elicit political and other concessions as has become the norm in Brussels.