U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell is quietly convincing German companies to discontinue business with Iran.
Grenell has scored a series of victories in recent days by successfully lobbying against a $400 million payment from the German central bank to the Islamic Republic and convincing car company Daimler to cancel expansion plans in the country.
Many German businesses rushed to do business with Iran after the signing of the nuclear deal in 2015.
The Trump administration, however, has pulled out of the nuclear deal and announced Monday that it would re-impose the same economic sanctions on Iran that the Obama administration removed as part of the deal. The new economic sanctions will limit Iranian ability to use the U.S. dollar, to trade in precious metals, and target its import/export businesses to the United States.
The sanctions also affect any business that wishes do business with U.S. entities.
“The Trump administration intends to fully enforce the sanctions reimposed against Iran, and those who fail to wind down activities with Iran risk severe consequences,” the White House warned in a Monday release.
Grenell was particularly instrumental in convincing Daimler to cancel its expansion and business with Iran, having met with the CEO of the company on several occasions, a U.S. official familiar with the process tells The Daily Caller.
The ambassador has met with several other CEOs of major German companies with planned business in Iran to deliver a stark message: either do business with Iran or the U.S., but not both.
U.S. pressure on German companies is part of a broader Trump-administration strategy to negotiate a new nuclear deal with Iran. The United States is bringing pressure to bear on Iran in the form of economic sanctions which have dramatically affected the Islamic Republic’s currency and isolated it from the global economic system.