US wants SWIFT war on Iran
By Pepe Escobar
AsiaTimes.com
Feb 17, 2012
What was the parade of European poodles thinking – that Tehran would just roll over and absorb the European Union’s oil embargo, scheduled to start on July 1?
No wonder Brussels was caught as a Gucci deer in the headlights when the news started to flow that Tehran would pre-empt the move and immediately slap its own embargo of crude oil exports to six European Union countries – deeply in crisis Club Med members Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain plus recession-hit France and the Netherlands.
It took virtually no time for Iran’s Oil Ministry and then the Foreign Ministry to deny it; such a decision, technically, would have to be officially announced by the Supreme National Security Council, which also deals with the nuclear negotiations.
But only the deaf, dumb and blind wouldn’t understand the message; blowback for the ridiculously counter-productive European sanctions/oil embargo package will only plunge vast swathes of Europe further into deep economic pain.
Iran supplies 500,000 barrels of oil a day to the EU. The mere threat of an Iranian embargo has already provoked an oil price spike.
Assuming Club Med countries would be able to get oil from other sources – and that’s not a given; Saudi Arabia wants high oil prices with a vengeance – they would have to reconfigure their refineries to process it. Inevitably there would be shortages of gasoline; the average Italian, for instance, is already furious with the skyrocketing price of gas at the pump.
The Rest…HERE
