Tehran, Iran, June 18
By A. Shirazi - Trend:
An Iranian lawmaker said French carmaker Renault could not be a good trade partner for the Islamic Republic.
“Economically speaking, it is in the interest of Renault to maintain its presence in a country with a population of 80 million,” a member of the Parliament Industries and Mines Commission, Vali Maleki, told ICANA news agency on June 18.
If Renault plans to remain in Iran’s market without doing any investments and only with the aim of supplying auto parts, it would be demoted from a bad trade partner to a worse one as it has not honored its past contracts with Iran, he added.
In a recent statement, Renault CEO Carlos Ghosn said, “We will not abandon it, even if we have to downsize very strongly”. He added that such presence in Iran would give the company an advantage "when the market reopens".
The Iranian lawmaker stressed that Renault must honor the terms of all of its current joint ventures with Iranian car manufacturers and that it should not scale down the level of its activities in the country due to the threat of the US sanctions.
Noting that the French carmaker has not yet complied with all its contractual commitments, Maleki added that Renault, accordingly, is not good trade partner for Iran.
US President Donald Trump announced on May 8 that Washington was walking away from the nuclear agreement, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which was reached between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council - the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China - plus Germany.
Trump also said he would reinstate US nuclear sanctions on Iran and impose "the highest level" of economic bans on the Islamic Republic.
PSA, the maker of Peugeot and Citroen cars, has suspended its joint venture activities in Iran, despite having promised to stand its ground in the face of sanctions.
PSA and its French rival Renault were among the first European companies which rushed to Iran to tap into a pent-up demand for new automobiles after sanctions were lifted on the country in 2016.
Both Renault and Peugeot withdrew from Iran in 2012 when the country came under the Western sanctions.
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