After Iran confirms it has halted certain nuclear activity, U.S. and EU loosen spigot.

The article can be found here.

   Iran, agreeing to a deal between the United States and the European Union, on Monday announced that it has ceased certain nuclear activities that it agreed to halt as part of its breakthrough deal with western powers. The November deal called for Iran to cease enrichment of uranium above 5%, begin the process of diluting some of its stockpile of 20% enriched uranium, and verify that it has not installed additional centrifuges at two key nuclear facilities.As part of the deal, Iran will gain access, in installments, to roughly $4.2 billion of its restricted reserve funds over the next six months. The funds will be dispersed as Iran makes progress in completing its dilution of 20% enriched uranium. Another $2 billion will come as a result of loosening some trade restrictions in the petrochemical, precious metals and auto industries. Iran is also expected to receive some relief that will allow it to make payments for humanitarian goods, university tuition assistance for Iranian students abroad and Iran's U.N. obligations (article).

   This is a great and scary thing. The benefits and goods from this deal will help Iran to (hopefully) grow more stable and (another hopefully) better improve conditions within the country. This is a benefit of globalization (as discussed in class today), services and information can easily be shared from all over the world. But a detrimental cost to this deal is that as Iran's economy continues to improve, the Iranian leadership will have less incentive to negotiate a comprehensive nuclear deal. Our leverage on Iran is shrinking, and this could be dangerous. But the Obama administration counters that the overwhelming majority of more than a decade of sanctions against Iran's oil, banking and financial industries remain in place and the U.S. remains committed to aggressively enforcing the existing sanctions. I'm hopeful that Iran takes this as an opportunity to improve itself and becomes an ally with the United States through trade and various other sources. (I apologize, I don't fully understand what I'm doing on these comparative blogs yet.)