 Hello, welcome to NewsClick. The U.S. yesterday imposed sanctions on Iran after having exited from the nuclear deal. Now, this is being considered as a violation of international law and of the UN Security Council Resolution 2231. So, to talk about that further, we have with us Prabir Pulkaiyasta. So, sir, before we talk about what exactly happened and what were the implications, what do you think is the intention behind this move? I think Trump wanted at least to establish that he can get a better deal than Obama did. This is, of course, one part of the electioneering he did during his campaigning as Hillary Clinton. There is a very bad deal. The U.S. has screwed up badly. The Obama presidency was poor. They did not have a proper deal and so on. So, that has been a background part of it. But probably the driving force behind the deal is really Israel, who wanted Iran to be isolated in West Asia and particularly after Bashar al-Assad's victory in Syria. And effectively, he has won the ground war in Syria. The need to also keep Iran out of, shall we say, nearby region. Lebanon, of course, they are already there with Hezbollah. Now, they are in Syria. They have been the allies of Bashar al-Assad on the ground in the battle against insurgency there, which, as you know, was a proxy war by the U.S., the West, Saudi Arabia as well as by Israel. So, with all that has happened, I think the issue was Israel would like to put more pressure on Iran and the United States is their best bet to do it because there is no way Israel can really directly put pressure on Iran. So, if the U.S. imposes sanctions, then Iran will be far more on the defensive. And Iran is an 80 million people with a vibrant economy. It has oil and gas reserves. So, it's obviously a much bigger player in the region than Israel would be, which is outsider in the region considered as such and also relatively a much smaller economy. So, I think this is U.S. serving Israel's direct interest by trying to isolate Iran and, of course, with the help of Saudi Arabia as well. So, this move, if we can talk about its impact on other stakeholders like all important countries like India itself, what do you think is going to be an impact on these countries? Of course, the intent to hurt Iran means all those who import Iranian gas or oil are going to be hurt because they have already been buying from Iran. They will have to diversify their source of energy or they will have to run the gauntlet of U.S. sanctions as well. So, this is the twin danger that all oil importing countries from Iran or gas importing countries from Iran will get. India has an additional problem because it was a partner to Iran in both the Chawar port as well as also in the one of the Iranian gas fields. So, there is a future investment also existing investment at stake for India. One part for India is very clear that our energy bill is going to rise because Iran was also supplying us at lower rates also giving us longer credit. Also, it's closer to us Iran is virtually next door. So, the freight charges are also less, the insurance costs are lower. So, this is going to raise India's energy bill considerably. Plus, the kind of crude that Iran was selling to us is also suitable for our certain refineries. If we want to get that crude, that kind of crude, we will then have to either pay more or we will have to change some of the refinery setting, some of the refinery equipment that we have used in order to process other feeds. So, for us economically, it's going to be definitely a setback and it can increase our energy bill by say about 8 to 10 percent which is a very high figure. We are importing a considerable amount of our hydrocarbons today, oil and gas from Iran. So, this is going to be a certainly an economically something which is going to hit us. It's also not going to be easy to file alternate sources of oil because Iranian oil, if it goes out of the market as US intends, of course, other countries like China and Turkey have said they will not accept the sanctions. But if they do have to accept reduction or at least not increase their consumption or stop buying Iranian oil, there is going to be huge dislocation in the oil market and it certainly push up the cost considerably. America is trying to sell India shale oil or gas and I think per equivalent say barrel of oil, if you take the equivalent cost which is roughly at the level of today 70, 75 dollars, I think we will be adding another 10, 15 dollars to that. Of course, the oil prices have been fluctuating from 50 to 75 in the last 6 months. So, we have to see what the current prices are, but it can add considerably to our oil bill. So, this is the huge one part of the risk we carry that it risks the Indian economy and also with the current inflation pressures that we are seeing. It means worsening of the situation, we are not exporting more goods. So, our foreign exchange also position may actually weaken as a consequence. The second part of it I think which is the bigger issue in the global market it can create a situation where the oil prices rise. It can go up from 70 to 80 dollars to 90 dollars even 100 dollars. We do not know what the amount of prices that with what the kind of prices we are likely to see because it means a huge amount of oil which is currently available going out of the market. Let us also look at the other side. America is also sanctioning, the United States is also sanctioning Russia. It is also trying to force Russia to export less to western Europe because the pressure in western Europe is to buy shale gas from the United States, same offer they giving India. So, that is also the second pressure that is being put on the oil markets. Russia is another big exporter and then the third big exporter Venezuela which is also the sanctions. So, all of this could be a ploy of Trump since we asked the first question what is Trump's intent. It could be to raise the oil prices to a level where shale gas becomes economic and shale oil becomes economic because the United States is a larger producer of shale oil and shale gas. So, these are the consequences. I think India has to make a firm position and say we will not accept this illegal sanctions and try and see how they can then have a long-term deal with Iran which was the kind of barter agreement it had earlier that we will sell to you certain goods and we will buy you from oil and gas. And if there is a deficit in the Indian side then we make do with the third country partner like Turkey, like Russia or like Chayda so that we can at least buy goods from them and or goods sell goods to them and then make up the difference with Iranian oil. So, you know that you mentioned stakeholders and firm positions Russia after Trump's remark about how no one is going to be in business with the US if they are going to be in business with Iran. So, Russia declared that we are still going to be in business with Iran and a lot of EU firms it has come to notice that are nullifying the US legal action. So, do you think this whole move and this deal is going to have a boomerang effect for the US? Let us look at it this way. Chayda and Russia are certainly not going to accept American sanctions. They are already at least Russia is already under US sanctions. So, he does not really care. China has said they will not accept the sanctions. China is too big an economic player. There is not much the United States can do about it because both Chinese and American economy are tied in a way that one cannot sanction the other without pains themselves. So, that is as far as China is concerned. As far as other partners and Turkey must also be considered a factor, Turkey has also said it is not going to accept the US sanctions. Turkey's relationship with the United States is also not particularly good. We have had a break in relations with Canada but this is a part of the larger problems now Turkey seems to have with NATO. Coming to the EU firms, now EU firms we are talking about lots of things but the problem that the EU as a whole has and particularly the companies in the EU have is there very much a part of the dollar regime. There are part of the dollar economy and any country which clears foreign exchange in dollars has to deal with the United States and if United States uses its sanctioned power then this dollar trade becomes almost impossible. So, they have to now work out what is the alternative that they have if not using the dollar that is one the number one problem all these companies are going to get. The second problem the companies are going to get they have also huge economic stake in the US market. So, either in buying vital parts of components that they need or in exporting the finished goods to the United States. So, I think it is not so easy for the European Union companies to be able to run the sanctions. In fact, the issue is what can their governments do and will their governments protect them in certain ways against your sanctions. There have been times where they have done this or they have promised to do this but how much this will succeed we have to see because as you said earlier this is illegal sanctions if Americans can get away with the US illegal sanctions and if the EU collapses in front of the US sanctions then it means that EU does not really have an independent economic or foreign policy because they agree that Iran was completely within the completely satisfied all the clauses of the agreement the Iran did not violate any clause of the agreement and this is unilateral abrogation of an agreement which has been reached with six countries plus Iran. So, it is not that it was a unilateral agreement between the United States and Iran and this was something which was within the UN Security Council's purview. The UN Security Council has also taken this agreement into account and then also asked various things to be done in order to verify the accord and so on which is why the IIA was part of this agreement and observed it to various steps to see that Iran had kept it. So, after all of this if the other EU partners who were a part of the agreement do not or are not able to stand up to US pressure I think it would be a very unfortunate day for them that they really at the end of it have no independent foreign policy. Thank you Prabir for taking out time to speak with us. Thank you for watching NewsClick.