Week 8 (Final Week) Multilateralism in

Peril? The example of the Iran Nuclear Deal

Dr. Agha Bayramov
 Outline

 The Iran Nuclear Deal: Brief History

 Multilateralism
 Russian Multilateral Challenges
 China, the EU and the US
 Companies
The Iran Nuclear Deal: History 1

 Iran’s first nuclear facility, 1967

 in 1970, Iran signedand ratified the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)
 Iran received from Siemens and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
technical equipment and training
 the 1979 Iranian Revolution
 In 1995, Russia replaced the West
 the Iran–Libya Sanctions Act in 1996
The Iran Nuclear Deal: History 2

 In October 2003, Iran agreed to suspend uranium

 talks with the E3 (Germany, France and the UK),
 Iran signed the 2004 Paris Agreement,
 the George W. Bush administration demand of “zero enrichment” in Iran
 With Barack Obama’s election in 2008
The Iran Nuclear Deal: History 3

 the Iran Nuclear Deal, was signed on July 14, 2015

 In November 2016, Donald J. Trump was elected as the 45th President of the
United States.
 In May 2018, President Trump also announced that the US would withdraw
from the Iran Nuclear Deal.
Multilateralism

 first, Robert O. coordinates national policies in groups of three or more states

 Ruggie: the basis of certain principles of ordering relations among those

states”

 multilateralism can be seen as a form of international praxis,

 also include major international economic and security actors, such as

transnational corporations and terrorist networks.
Multilateralism

 three dimensions of multilateralism: institutions, norms and negotiation.

 the complex relationships between the actors’ own ‘regime-ness’,

 a mixture of internal and external normative forces.

 actors’ commitment to processes on the one hand of bargaining and on the

other of problem-solving.
Russia and the Multilateral IOs: the OSCE

 The OSCE is active in all fields of security:

 a membership of 57 states
 two routine decision-making structures, the Permanent Council (PC) and the
Forum for Security and Cooperation (FSC), which meet in Vienna on a weekly
basis.
 the Ukraine crisis,
 the general narrative pushed forward by Russian delegates is that western
countries are solely to blame for the Ukraine crisis, as they allegedly failed to
‘respect’ Russia.
Russia and the Multilateral IOs: the OSCE

 Russian interest: counter-terrorism.

 Russia may not be perfect, but western countries are no better and probably
worse.
 Russia denies being a party to the conflict
 To routinely mix real and fake information
Russia and the OSCE

 Raising concerns about freedom of press in France or the United States

 ‘they find a topic which no one thinks has any purchase

Russia and the UNSC

 to emphasise the defence of sovereignty above anything else.

 to oppose anything that could appear as a potential foreign interference
 Russia is extremely reluctant to develop more robust peacekeeping operations
 Russian focus on status and the importance of states in global governance,
Russia and the UNSC
The EU

 multilateralism is said to be in its DNA,

 the EU is a ‘post-modern’ international actor
 the EU as an ‘emerging international actor’ committed to multilateralism
 the EU actually lives up to its own propaganda
 the EU lacks credibility
The EU

 Four different dimensions of effectiveness in the case of the EU: internal

 external
 what might be termed institutional
 the ways
 relatively ineffective
The US

 ‘selective multilateralist’,
 focused on sovereigntist assumptions
 the changing power position of the US
 the Obama administration’s pragmatic realist approach
 the US posture on multilateralism as ‘domesticist’,
The US

 the election of Donald Trump as President in 2016

 the US as a victim of globalisation
 US denunciation of the 2015 Paris climate change agreement,
 Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership,
 withdrawal from UNESCO
 and Iranian compliance
 characterised by uncertainty and by unpredictability
China

 pragmatic

 participate, engage, push for cooperation or block/delay initiatives that

would harm its interests

 the Western sanctions are not solution because: not a legitimate tool to
pressure Iran, the hegemonic power of the West, and Iran lacks advance
technology
 to balance the US’s hegemonic influence in the region.
The EU and China: the Iran Nuclear Deal

 China:
 based on apolitical logic.
 diverse commercial ties
 “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR)
 not willing to get involved in the regional issues.
 China confirmed its support to the JCPOA
 supportive language towards
 China is itself a nuclear-weapon state
The EU and China: the Iran Nuclear Deal

 China:
 a 10 billion dollars credit line with Iran, and the China Development Bank is
considering 15 billion dollars more

 beyond economic interests

 geopolitical stability in the region

 to prevent a full-scale conflict

The EU and China: the Iran Nuclear Deal

 EU:
 The EU:
 a rules-based multilateral
 the EU as a credible and coherent player in the global arena
 an actor in foreign policy and boosted its effective multilateral approach
 the Joint Commission, which is responsible for the implementation of the Iran
Nuclear Deal.
 stood committed to the nuclear deal
The EU and China: the Iran Nuclear Deal

 The EU
 the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV)or INSTEX.
 humanitarian goods
 Europeans need to buy oil
 Emmanuel Macron, has started an initiative to offer Iran a 15bn dollars credit
line (FinancialTimes 2019).
The EU and China: the Iran Nuclear Deal

 EU: in 2018 the European Commission (EC) adopted a 50 million

 Austria, Denmark, and Italy,
 the EIB was ‘not the right tool’ to save the nuclear deal
 the EU indeed has an array of tools and instruments in place to maintain the
nuclear deal.
Iran Deal: Companies

Transnational corporations are one of the silent actors

How companies have positioned themselves in the nuclear deal and with what
effect?
companies leveraged the negotiators, including the United States, into
compromise.
Siemens, Shell, Peugeot, and Renault
penalty payments
Total announced that it would pull out of the billion-dollar deal it made with
both Iran and the Chinese company CNCP
the EU is willing to save the deal but this seems to be less likely without
involvement of its transnational corporations.
The EU Companies

 modern advanced Western technology,

 the 400 billion dollar Iranian market, vs the 19 trillion dollar US market
Chinese Companies

 Big state-owned companies (CNPC, Sinopec, and CNOOC)

 Chinese companies have also received loans
 Not fully secured from the US economic sanctions
 Chinese telecom giants Huawei and ZTE have been fined by the US
 Cosco, a leading Chinese shipping and logistics company
Chinese companies

 Total left its billion-dollar energy deal with Iran in 2018.

 the Chinese company CNCP agreed to replace Total.
 In October 2019, CNPC though already left Iran
 Similarly, in 2018, the Bank of Kunlun, suspended most financial transactions
with Iran
Chinese companies

 some Chinese firms are prioritizing the US and Europe over Iran
 The export of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to China
 Chinese companies are frustrated with Iran.
 their behaviour is not fully in accordance with Beijing’s official political
declarations.
 China and the EU thus need to gain commercial support of their transnational
corporations.