America and the United Kingdom are tough against Tehran, but the weak link at the top is Europe. The problem is sanctions: “Each country decides with different rules”, said the Foreign Minister
During the final press conference of the G7 Foreign Ministers meeting in Capri, the current president, Antonio Tajani, today he said that if Israel’s attack against Iran – in response to the missiles and drones launched last Saturday by Tehran against the Jewish state – was contained, it was also due to the fruit of the political work of the G7 which “serves to improve the climate: I want to be optimistic. The political objective of the G7 is de-escalation”. Moreover, the diplomatic meeting of the world’s greats ended in a rather anomalous way, with several changes of program and the American secretary of state, Antony Blinkenbusy all night yesterday with the developments of the crisis and the Israeli response on Isfahan. In the end there were three different final statements. One dedicated to the situation in the Middle East, one to support for Ukraine, and the last on “global challenges”.
During the final press conference of the G7 Foreign Ministers meeting in Capri, the current president, Antonio Tajani, today he said that if Israel’s attack against Iran – in response to the missiles and drones launched last Saturday by Tehran against the Jewish state – was contained, it was also due to the fruit of the political work of the G7 which “serves to improve the climate: I want to be optimistic. The political objective of the G7 is de-escalation”. Moreover, the diplomatic meeting of the world’s greats ended in a rather anomalous way, with several changes of program and the American secretary of state, Antony Blinkenbusy all night yesterday with the developments of the crisis and the Israeli response on Isfahan. In the end there were three different final statements. One dedicated to the situation in the Middle East, one to support for Ukraine, and the last on “global challenges”.
The meeting of G7 foreign ministers
As anticipated by the international media, for the first time in the statement on the Middle East specific mention is made of the sanctions against Iran: regarding Tehran’s support for Hamas and the Houthis, the document reads, “we will hold the Iranian government accountable for its malicious and destabilizing actions and we stand ready to adopt further sanctions or take other measures, now and in response to further destabilizing initiatives” . The seven signatory countries also warn Iran about transferring ballistic missiles and weapons manufacturing technologies to Russia. But the general caution in the hypothesis of imposing new sanctions, at the center of the debate in recent days, was also made clear by Tajani: “Each country decides with different rules”, and added that for the European response we will have to wait for next Monday’s Foreign Affairs Council.
The attempt by America and the United Kingdom for a stronger announcement against Iran that came from the Capri coalition therefore seems to have failed. Already almost twenty-four hours before the end of the G7 meeting, Washington and London had announced the list of Iranian individuals and entities added to the list of hundreds already under economic sanctions. The US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said the day before yesterday it had sanctioned sixteen individuals, all of Iranian nationality, and two Iranian companies that produce the engines of the drones used in the attack on April 13 against Israel. On the list there are also five companies involved in the production of steel and three companies linked to Iran’s most important car manufacturer, the Bahman Group, which has already been under sanctions for many years: the company is accused of materially supporting the Iranian army and to help the Islamic Revolutionary Guards evade economic restrictions. Analysts call them the “new old sanctions”, those that were more predictable and it is not known whether they will have a concrete effect on Iranian armaments. Today, however, the US Congress included sanctions on Iranian oil exports in the aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. Reuters wrote that if approved by both houses of Congress and then signed by President Joe Biden, the measures “could impact Iran’s oil exports,” which continue to grow thanks to demand from China. It is not clear what type of further sanctions will be applied, because the export of Iranian crude oil is already heavily sanctioned: according to rumors, these could be measures against ports and refineries that process Iranian oil – therefore not just Iranians. Capitol Hill also intends to lobby the European Union to soon define the Iranian Revolutionary Guards as a “terrorist organization”, in line with American policies. This will also be discussed at the European Foreign Council next Monday, but it is unlikely that the EU will take an equally tough position against Tehran and its closest allies, such as China.
