Germany to Iran: Recognize Israel

German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, who is also Germany’s economy minister, on Sunday said Iran must recognize Israel in order to have economic relations with Germany.

 

“Questioning [Israel’s] right to existence is something that we Germans cannot accept,” Gabriel said at the start of a three-day visit to Tehran, according to the German dpa news agency.

 

“You can’t have a good economic relationship with Germany in the long term if we don’t discuss such issues and try to move them along,” he told a gathering of German and Iranian businesspeople in Tehran.

 

Gabriel, who will hold talks with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and several ministers during the visit, said he wanted to talk to human rights representatives in a country that the United Nations says is guilty of human rights violations against women, religious minorities, journalists and activists, Reuters reported.

 

By traveling to Tehran with a delegation of industry group representatives and company officials, Gabriel sends a strong signal that Germany wants to quickly rebuild economic and political ties with Iran, the news agency noted.

 

Under an agreement struck on Tuesday, sanctions imposed by the United States, European Union and United Nations will be lifted in exchange for Iran agreeing long-term curbs on a nuclear program that the West thought was intended to make a nuclear bomb. Tehran has always denied seeking nuclear arms.

 

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