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Source: http://www.worldcrunch.com/new-sanctions-and-whispers-war-europe-iran-standoff/4216
New Sanctions and Whispers of War in Europe-Iran Standoff
(Die Welt-Germany) Christoph B. Schiltz - EU foreign ministers have now agreed to work on sanctions that could include stopping oil imports and cutting Iran's financial system off from the West in new sanctions that will be finalized in January. Germany, France and the UK expressed particularly strong support for harsher sanctions. Cutting off oil imports from Iran has been repeatedly discussed in the past, but now French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe is saying that the EU will work with Greece and Italy to increase deliveries from other countries to make up for the deliveries they now receive from Iran. "It's doable," Juppe stressed. According to Walter Posch, an Iran expert at the Berlin-based German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), the new sanctions will make Iran's economic development - and with it, the survival of the present regime - that much more difficult. Earlier sanctions have already hurt Iran, said Posch: "They have contributed significantly to the country's underdevelopment."