Russia is getting ready to invest US$50 billion in Iran’s oil and gas industry as the two countries continue to seek closer ties, just as the United States is looking to cut as much Iranian crude oil exports from the market as possible.
“Russia is ready to invest $50bn in Iran’s oil and gas sectors,” according to Ali Akbar Velayati, Senior Adviser for International Affairs of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, as carried by the Financial Times.
Velayati was on a visit to Moscow that included a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“Military and technical co-operation with Russia is of major importance to Iran,” FT quoted Velayati as saying.
An independent Chinese refiner has suspended crude oil purchases from the United States and has now turned to Iran as one of its sources of crude, media reports, citing an official from the refiner, Dongming Petrochemical Group.
What’s more, the source said that Beijing is planning to slap tariffs on U.S. crude oil imports and replace them with West African and Middle Eastern crude, including crude from Iran. China has already said that it will not comply with U.S. sanctions against Iran and it seems to be the only country for now in a position to do this.
The US is the world’s single largest economy, but still only 25% of world GDP. If we thought pulling out of the Iran deal would have some huge effect while the other 75% of the world GDP remained available to Iran, we were fooling ourselves.
Thos has been the central,conceit behind Trump’s America First strategy from the get go- the attitude of “the world needs us more than we need the world”.
I’ve been saying some time now wait until “America First” turns into “America Alone”.
Such a critical time for the world…the issues it faces requires so much collaborative effort…and it was at this critical stage that the group that believes everyone else on the world is a rival ascended into political power.
Do I think my fellow Americans will observe this and make their buying considerations while considering these developments? Nope…I don’t. The idea of buy American, died with Sam Walton.
