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Germany Suspends Measures to Promote Business with Iran

A protester holds a portrait of Mahsa Amini during a demonstration in support of Amini, a young Iranian woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by the country's morality police, on Istiklal avenue in Istanbul, Türkiye, on September 20, 2022. (AFP)
A protester holds a portrait of Mahsa Amini during a demonstration in support of Amini, a young Iranian woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by the country's morality police, on Istiklal avenue in Istanbul, Türkiye, on September 20, 2022. (AFP)
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Germany Suspends Measures to Promote Business with Iran

A protester holds a portrait of Mahsa Amini during a demonstration in support of Amini, a young Iranian woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by the country's morality police, on Istiklal avenue in Istanbul, Türkiye, on September 20, 2022. (AFP)
A protester holds a portrait of Mahsa Amini during a demonstration in support of Amini, a young Iranian woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by the country's morality police, on Istiklal avenue in Istanbul, Türkiye, on September 20, 2022. (AFP)

Germany's government is suspending state measures designed to foster business with Iran due to the repression of nationwide protests in Iran, the economy ministry said on Friday.

The suspension will affect export credits and investment guarantees as well as Germany's manager training and trade fair programs in Iran, the ministry said.

German-Iranian trade totaled $1.87 billion in 2021, according to Reuters.

The death in custody of Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, after her arrest by the morality police for violating Iran's dress code, unleashed years of pent-up grievances in the country over issues ranging from tightening social and political controls to economic misery and discrimination against ethnic minorities.

Moreover, Luxembourg has expressed concern to Iran about one of its residents feared to have been detained and facing execution there, the government said on Friday.

Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn called his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian on Thursday to address the situation, the statement said.

Luxembourg did not name the detainee but described him as "a resident of Luxembourg of Iranian origin who, according to available information, may have been arrested and condemned to capital punishment."

Tehran has launched a crackdown on a wave of anti-government demonstrations and announced at least 11 death sentences in connection with the protests.

It was not immediately clear whether the Luxembourg resident was among those. But Asselborn used his call "to plead in favor of the Iranian demonstrators risking their lives to win respect for their fundamental rights, and in particular for those who have been sentenced to death."

The statement did not report the Iranian minister's response.

In a related context, the United States has announced another round of sanctions against Iranian officers and the public prosecutor involved in the government’s crackdown on protesters.

The US Department of the Treasury said on Twitter that it was slapping sanctions on Iran’s Prosecutor General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri for issuing “a directive to courts to act decisively and issue harsh sentences to many of those arrested during the ongoing protests.”

The Imen Sanat Zaman Fara company was also designated by the US because it manufactures equipment used by Iran’s Law Enforcement Forces (LEF).

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China’s Xi Jinping to Visit Russia Next Month for BRICS Summit 

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana, Kazakhstan July 3, 2024. (Sputnik/Sergei Guneev/Pool via Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana, Kazakhstan July 3, 2024. (Sputnik/Sergei Guneev/Pool via Reuters)
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China’s Xi Jinping to Visit Russia Next Month for BRICS Summit 

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana, Kazakhstan July 3, 2024. (Sputnik/Sergei Guneev/Pool via Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands during a meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana, Kazakhstan July 3, 2024. (Sputnik/Sergei Guneev/Pool via Reuters)

Chinese leader Xi Jinping will visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi confirmed Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence.

Xi's visit to Russia will be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia's action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for weapons production.

Wang Yi met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg Thursday and the two hailed ties between the two countries. The Chinese foreign minister said that Xi “happily accepted” Putin's invite to attend the BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan in October.

Putin, in turn, announced that the two will also sit down for a bilateral meeting in Kazan and discuss various aspects of the Russia-China relations, which “are developing quite successfully” and “in all directions.”

Xi last visited Russia in March 2023 and Putin reciprocated with his own trip to China in Oct. that year. The two leaders have since also met in Beijing in May, where Putin took the first foreign trip of his fifth presidential term, and in Kazakhstan in July.

After launching what the Kremlin calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine, Russia has become increasingly dependent economically on China as Western sanctions cut its access to much of the international trading system. China’s increased trade with Russia, totaling $240 billion last year, has helped the country mitigate some of the worst blows from the sanctions.

Moscow has diverted the bulk of its energy exports to China and relied on Chinese companies to import high-tech components for Russian military industries to circumvent Western sanctions.

The two countries have also deepened their military ties in the last two years.

The BRICS alliance was founded in 2006 by Brazil, Russia, India and China, with South Africa joining in 2010. It has recently undergone an expansion and now includes Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates.

BRICS has a stated aim to amplify the voice of major emerging economies to counterbalance the Western-led global order. Its founding members have called for a fairer world order and the reform of international institutions like the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.