Airbus team in Iran to finalize plane deal

Airbus delegates have arrived in Tehran for talks aimed at finalising a deal to sell around 100 planes, an Iranian official said Monday.

The representatives of the European aerospace giant arrived on Sunday just hours after national carrier Iran Air concluded a $16.6 billion deal with US firm Boeing to buy 80 planes.

“An Airbus delegation has arrived in Tehran,” said Asghar Fakhrieh Kashan, deputy minister for transport.

“We have started negotiations and if there are no problems, we will sign the agreement within a week for the purchase of around 100 planes,” he said. Meanwhile, some conservatives in Iran reacted angrily to news of the deal with Boeing, which comes at a time when lawmakers in Washington have recently voted for renewed sanctions on the country.

Iran says the renewal of sanctions, which President Barack Obama is expected to approve in the coming days, is a breach of the nuclear deal it signed with world powers last year. “60 trillion tomans: Iran’s gift to the US for violating the JCPOA (nuclear deal)”, read yesterday’s headline on the hardline Javan newspaper. But Iran has been desperate to access new planes and parts after decades of economic isolation has left it with one of the world’s worst aviation safety records.

Both Boeing and Airbus, which manufactures some of its parts in the United States, were granted special permission from the US Treasury in September to go ahead with deals in Iran. —AFP