France to push business ties with Iran despite uncertainty over nuclear deal

France will continue to encourage its firms to do business in Iran despite uncertainty surrounding the 2015 nuclear deal, which has put the business environment in “limbo,” a senior French finance official said on Thursday. “We are encouraging companies to keep doing business in Iran,” Joffrey Celestin-Urbain, director of bilateral relations at the Finance Ministry, told a Euromoney Iran conference. “We are in limbo on the international scene… This is the uncertainty our French companies are facing and this is something you have to take for granted if you want to do business in Iran.” French exports to Iran for the first 11 months of 2017 rose 120 percent to €1.29 billion ($1.58 billion) and imports grew 80 percent to €2.16 billion, Reuters quoted Celestin-Urbain as saying.