Secretary of State John Kerry called his French counterpart, Laurent Fabius, to express concern about the business delegation. The businesspeople met with top Iranian trade officials on Tuesday.
In testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday, Wendy Sherman, under secretary of state for political affairs and the Obama administration’s top negotiator with Iran, said Kerry and other senior US officials believe these trade visits are “not helpful.”
“Tehran is not open for business because our sanctions relief is quite temporary, quite limited and quite targeted,” Sherman told lawmakers.
“As far as we have seen today, there are not deals getting done, but rather people getting first in line in the hope that someday there will be a deal,” she said.
David Cohen, top Treasury sanctions official, also warned that companies or governments still risk heavy penalties under United Nations, US or European sanctions if they expanded trade with Iran.
“We are as crystal clear as possible in all of our engagements that if these talks turn into something more, if these talks turn into deals that violate the elaborate sanctions that remain in place, that we will take action,” Cohen said.
Major world powers reached an interim agreement with Iran on Nov. 24 to offer Tehran modest sanctions relief in return for Iran taking steps to limit its uranium enrichment activities. The deal called for negotiation of a full agreement within a year.
Sherman said that the nuclear deal was “not perfect” but it was a “first step” in trying to secure a comprehensive agreement.
An attempt to impose new sanctions on Iran has stalled in the Senate.
