美伊协议曝光：美国承诺解除对伊全部制裁并设3000亿美元重建基金

Since the US and Iran announced their memorandum of understanding orou, there have been persistent rumors that the deal could include a multi-billion dollar reconstruction fund for Iran to compensate for the damages incurred during the war. On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump essentially denied the rumors, posting on Truth Social that, quote, "The story that the US is paying Iran $300 million is fake news put out by the Democrats." However, on Tuesday, Bloombo published what they claimed to be the full text of theou and well 6 of the 14-point document apparently reads, "The United States undertakes together with its regional partners to create a comprehensive plan agreed upon by both parties for the rehabilitation and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran while ensuring financing of at least $300 billion." So, in this video, we're going to take a look at the deal. this $300 billion fund and explain why, as politically embarrassing as it might be for Trump, this could be genuinely great news for the Middle East. Trump has launched so many military interventions that it's kind of hard to keep track. So, in the latest issue of our magazine, Too Long, we go instance by instance to work out what Trump's been doing around the world and if he's launching a holy war. That's just some of the 80 pages in the magazine because there's more to too long than you'd expect. Purchase your copy by clicking the link in the description. So, before we get into the fund, we thought we should just take a look at the actual text of theou as reported by Bloomberg. Broadly speaking, it's pretty much what we expected and what we described in our video earlier this week. However, there are a couple of surprises in there. The first is that contrary to Trump's original truth social post, theou does not in fact oblige Iran to immediately or totally open the straight of rather.5 only requires Iran to quote take steps to ensure that the movement of merchant ships from the Persian Gulf to the Sea of Aman and vice versa is resumed within 30 days, taking into account the need for the removal of technical obstructions and the neutralization of mines by Iran. Nor does the MOU specifically prohibit Iran from imposing tolls or service fees of some sort on the straight of Hormuz. Only that it takes steps to bring traffic back to its pre-war volume. Second, while we always knew there was going to be some sort of sanctions relief involved, the US has agreed some pretty striking measures. Point 7, for instance, states that the United States commits to ending all types of sanctions currently facing the Islamic Republic of Iran. Point 11 also states that the United States undertakes that in the light of the progress of negotiations towards a final agreement, frozen or restrictive funds and assets of the Islamic Republic of Iran will be released and made fully available. Obviously, much still depends on progress in further negotiations, but the fact that the US has in principle agreed to withdraw effectively all sanctions on Iran nonetheless represents a pretty massive concession. The third and final bit worth mentioning is point4 which states that the final agreement will be approved through a binding resolution of the UN Security Council. For those of you who don't know, the Security Council is the only UN body that can impose binding decisions on its 193 member states. The Security Council has five permanent members, China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, who are collectively known as the P5, as well as 10 other non-permanent members who rotate on 2-year terms. For a resolution to pass in the Security Council, it needs nine affirmative votes and no negative votes from any P5 member who each have a veto. What's interesting about this is that the last Iran nuclear deal, the JCPOA, as negotiated by Obama, was also approved via a UN Security Council resolution. But this wasn't enough to stop Trump from unilaterally pulling out of the JCPOA in 2018. It will therefore be interesting to see how or if the UN tries to strengthen any subsequent resolution in order to guard against another American withdrawal in the future. Anyway, you get the idea. Theou as published by Bloomberg is even more embarrassing for the US than most people expected. And then on top of it all, there's this $300 billion fund. This is going to be especially politically difficult for Trump and the Republicans, given that they spent a lot of time criticizing Biden for handing over $6 billion in frozen funds to Iran as part of a hostage deal. And Trump was previously an advocate for maximum pressure sanctions. However, in Trump's defense, it's worth noting that this fund isn't actually going to be funded by the American taxpayer. In other words, the US isn't just paying Iran $300 billion straight out of the coffers. In fact, according to another report by Reuters published on Tuesday, the money is actually going to come from private companies who have already, according to Reuters at least, committed more than $150 billion. National governments will apparently do certain things to encourage investment, like securing loans, establishing credit lines, or maybe even directly financing reconstruction for sites damaged by the war. But the bulk of the actual investment is expected to come from the private sector. In some sense, this fund is trying to fix a long-standing problem for Iran and especially Iranian moderates. Namely, that historically sanctions relief hasn't worked as well as expected. For context, in previous negotiations between Iran and the West, the Iranians have essentially offered concessions on their nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. This gambit was especially popular with Iranian moderates, who hoped that sanctions relief would encourage massive foreign investment in Iran, which would help Iran build economic and eventually political relationships with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, for the moderates, this never really happened in large part because there was just too much uncertainty. Private investors didn't really understand how the sanctions worked and were very worried about falling foul of them and there was always some anxiety that they'd be reimposed later down the line which to be fair is exactly what happened in 2018. This is a phenomenon known in the literature as sanctions over compliance and it became a real problem for Iranian moderates because it lent credence to the hardliners arguments that sanctions relief wasn't worth it and Iran should thus give up on negotiations. Anyway, if this fund can actually get money flowing into Iran, it could be lucrative. Iran has some incredible untapped economic potential. Before the war, Iran's total GDP was sitting at a mere $400 billion or so, but its oil and gas reserves alone are roughly equivalent to those of Saudi Arabia, a commodity-based economy with a GDP of about $1.4 trillion, while its population is about as large and educated as that of Turkey, a non-commodity economy with a GDP of about $1.6 trillion. The point I'm trying to make is that with sufficient foreign investment and an even moderately competent government, Iran's economy could multiply in size. And this would be great news for both ordinary Iranians and the wider region. The latest issue of our magazine is out now. And if you want our best value ever, subscribing and using code summer 26 gets you your first copy for as cheap as £4.99, as well as 20% off as long as you stay subscribed. I told you about one of the articles at the start of this video, but this issue is truly jam-packed with content from all around the world. Obviously, the headline section is our rundown of Trump's wars around the world, discussing all the different countries and regions that have faced Trump's military wrath, going nation by nation through our timeline and reaching the ultimate question, has Trump created the modern holy war?

From there, we dive i