Earlier this week, the State Department revealed that they are ordering allies worldwide to stop buying oil from Iran. This is part of an effort to drive Iranian oil exports to zero, and is centered on the US withdrawing from the P5+1 nuclear deal.
This is having a substantial impact on the regional and global economy. Saudi Arabia looks to be the most immediate beneficiary, with the country expecting record oil production in the next month to meet rising demand.
The main purchasers of Iran’s oil exports are India and China, and Indian refiners have suggested that they will be obeying the US demands. China has not addressed the US demands, and probably won’t accept them, since they remain party to the nuclear deal.
Iran is still trying to secure continued exports abroad, particularly pushing the EU to agree to buy oil as part of saving the nuclear deal from the US. Whether this is successful remains to be seen, but the US seems determined to scare away Iran’s customers, and oil prices have been rising on the expectation this will continue.
Be careful what you wish for. Iran could take the opportunity and build up its refining capacity then just stop selling crude and related feed stocks and only offer finished products.
I do not have all that much knowledge about buying and selling oil; nor about in what ways it can be exported; i.e, sold and bought.
Bu if US succeeds in forcing countries not to buy Iranian oil; nor any of its products, it will make the world at least a bit less secure; on the account that Iran’s mullahic govt may be done away with and replaced by secular one.
And Iran will have to obtain also nuclear weapons. But, say, US promises and actually does destroy NW; to get Iran from making NW?
It still makes no difference to Iran and much of the world, because US, as long as it runs on the same ideology it always had, it will remain murderous and much distrustful.
US has accepted an extremely evil ideology: to the ‘fittest’ and the strongest belongs the Planet.
So that will always be a threat to any country that hasn’t adopted and may not ever accept US ideology.
After all, we, as specie [just like dogs, apes] survived only because we behaved much differently than Americans do now.
Imagine what we would have done if Iran had violated the agreement.