Iran: Richard Grenell wants to prevent the theft of money from Germany

10.07.2018

Up to 380 million euros
The United States wants to prevent Iran from flying out of Germany

Iran wants to bring back 380 million euros from Germany in Tehran – before the Iranian accounts are blocked. US Ambbadador Richard Grenell wants to prevent this and puts the federal government under pressure. He has a problem now.

US Ambbadador to Germany Richard Grenell called on the federal government to ban the planned cash transfer from Iran of 300 million euros. "We encourage the German government at the highest level to intervene and stop this movement," Grenell told the Bild (Tuesday). "We are very concerned about reports that the Iranian regime is trying to transfer hundreds of millions of euros in cash from a German bank to Iran."

Iran wants to fly millions of dollars from Germany to Tehran for money in the face of US sanctions, to save from the threat of freezing accounts. In particular, he is about to pay the balances of the Irano-European Commercial Bank of State in Hamburg with the Bundesbank. According to the information of the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung", it should even reach 380 million euros

The case is delicate because the United States is no longer bound by the nuclear agreement with the Iran and tighten the sanctions. Other partners in the agreement, including Germany, are still behind the treaties. If Germany were to prevent the transport of money, this could further jeopardize the nuclear deal and threaten a spiral of rearmament.

The project will be reviewed, said a spokeswoman for the Federal Ministry of Finance. Responsible for this is Bafin financial supervision. "According to my information, he is fit for the first time," said the spokesman for the plan of takeoff and transport. This would probably be one of the largest cash transfers in the history of the Federal Republic.

Proof of a transport ban should be extremely difficult

According to press reports from government sources, the federal government needs hard evidence to ban transportation – for example, that the money is used for illegal purposes. However, it is likely that it will be very difficult to prove that.

Following the announcement of new sanctions and the end of the nuclear deal by the United States, the Islamic country must be afraid of being soon unable to obtain credit from the United States. # 39; abroad. The United States also threatens to impose sanctions on financial institutions that directly or indirectly support transactions with Iranian institutions.

But even outside the financial sector, Western and therefore German companies fear being targeted by the United States. The French shipping company CMA CGM had therefore announced this weekend that it was withdrawing completely from Iranian affairs

rei with news agencies