Iran to continue nuclear talks with Europe amid looming UN sanctions
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said afterward that both sides had presented specific ideas on sanctions relief and the nuclear issue."While seriously criticising their stances regarding the recent war of aggression against our people, we explained our principled positions, including on the so-called snapback mechanism," he said."It was agreed that consultations on this matter will continue."The European countries, along with China and Russia, are the remaining parties to the 2015 deal - from which the US withdrew in 2018 - which lifted sanctions on Iran in return for restrictions on its nuclear programme.A deadline of October 18 is fast approaching when the resolution governing that deal expires.At that point, all UN sanctions on Iran will be lifted unless the "snapback" mechanism is triggered at least 30 days before. This would automatically reimpose those sanctions, which target sectors from hydrocarbons to banking and defence.To give time for this to happen, the E3 have set a deadline of the end of August to revive diplomacy. Diplomats say they want Iran to take concrete steps to convince them to extend the deadline by up to six months.EUROPEANS WANT NUCLEAR COMMITMENTS FROM IRANIran would need to make commitments on key issues including eventual talks with Washington, full cooperation with the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and accounting for 400 kg (880 pounds) of near-weapons-grade highly enriched uranium, whose whereabouts are unknown since last month's strikes.Before the talks, an Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson had said Tehran considered talk of extending UN Security Council Resolution 2231 to be "meaningless and baseless".IAEA head Rafael Grossi said he was optimistic that nuclear inspection visits might be able to restart this year and that it was important to discuss the technical details now."We need to agree on where to go, how to do it. We need to listen to Iran in terms of what they consider should be the precautions to be taken," he told reporters in Singapore.advertisementThe United States held five rounds of talks with Iran prior to its airstrikes in June, which US President Donald Trump said had "obliterated" a programme that Washington and its ally Israel say is aimed at acquiring a nuclear bomb.However, NBC News has cited current and former U.S. officials as saying a subsequent US assessment found that while the strikes destroyed most of one of three targeted nuclear sites, the other two were not as badly damaged.Iran denies seeking a nuclear weapon and says its nuclear programme is meant solely for civilian purposes.- Ends
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Israel will have to make decision, says Trump as Gaza crisis worsens
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Iran executes 2 opposition members over alleged attacks on civilian sites
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U.S EU Trade deal: Who wins after tariff agreement - Donald Trump or Europe?
Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads FAQs U.S EU Trade deal agreement has finally been chalked. In the end, Europe found it lacked the leverage to pull Donald Trump 's America into a trade pact on its terms and so has signed up to a deal it can just about stomach - albeit one that is clearly skewed in the U.S.'s favour. As such, Sunday's agreement on a blanket 15 per cent tariff after a months-long stand-off is a reality check on the aspirations of the 27-country European Union to become an economic power able to stand up to the likes of the United States or has long portrayed itself as an export superpower and champion of rules-based commerce for the benefit both of its own soft power and the global economy as a whole. For sure, the new tariff that will now be applied is a lot more digestible than the 30% "reciprocal" tariff which Trump threatened to invoke in a few it should ensure Europe avoids recession, it will likely keep its economy in the doldrums: it sits somewhere between two tariff scenarios the European Central Bank last month forecast would mean 0.5-0.9 per cent economic growth this year compared to just over 1% in a trade tension-free this is nonetheless a landing point that would have been scarcely imaginable only months ago in the pre-Trump 2.0 era, when the EU along with much of the world could count on U.S. tariffs averaging out at around 1.5%.Even when Britain agreed a baseline tariff of 10% with the United States back in May, EU officials were adamant they could do better and - convinced the bloc had the economic heft to square up to Trump - pushed for a "zero-for-zero" tariff took a few weeks of fruitless talks with their U.S. counterparts for the Europeans to accept that 10% was the best they could get and a few weeks more to take the same 15% baseline which the United States agreed with Japan last week."The EU does not have more leverage than the U.S., and the Trump administration is not rushing things," said one senior official in a European capital who was being briefed on last week's negotiations as they closed in around the 15% official and others pointed to the pressure from Europe's export-oriented businesses to clinch a deal and so ease the levels of uncertainty starting to hit businesses from Finland's Nokia to Swedish steelmaker SSAB ."We were dealt a bad hand. This deal is the best possible play under the circumstances," said one EU diplomat. "Recent months have clearly shown how damaging uncertainty in global trade is for European businesses."That imbalance - or what the trade negotiators have been calling "asymmetry" - is manifest in the final only is it expected that the EU will now call off any retaliation and remain open to U.S. goods on existing terms, but it has also pledged $600 billion of investment in the United States. The time-frame for that remains undefined, as do other details of the accord for talks unfolded, it became clear that the EU came to the conclusion it had more to lose from all-out retaliatory measures it threatened totalled some 93 billion euros - less than half its U.S. goods trade surplus of nearly 200 billion a growing number of EU capitals were also ready to envisage wide-ranging anti-coercion measures that would have allowed the bloc to target the services trade in which the United States had a surplus of some $75 billion last even then, there was no clear majority for targeting the U.S. digital services which European citizens enjoy and for which there are scant homegrown alternatives - from Netflix to Uber to Microsoft cloud remains to be seen whether this will encourage European leaders to accelerate the economic reforms and diversification of trading allies to which they have long paid lip service but which have been held back by national the deal as a painful compromise that was an "existential threat" for many of its members, Germany's BGA wholesale and export association said it was time for Europe to reduce its reliance on its biggest trading partner."Let's look on the past months as a wake-up call," said BGA President Dirk Jandura. "Europe must now prepare itself strategically for the future - we need new trade deals with the biggest industrial powers of the world."A1. President of USA is Donald Trump.A2. US is levying 15 per cent tariffs on Europe.
