Originally posted by takeo
good, we are helping to make Iran more affluent and westernised and making bucks at the same time, we are also stepping up our investments in Cuba.

The US economic blackmail won't help to make Iran more moderate, rather on the contrary. This kind of policy encourages isolation, destitution, poverty and extremism, the European approach on the other hand encouurages countries to become more open, more wealthy and more business-minded, which in turn will influence political decisionmaking and general mentality as well.
You have a point about economic sanctions. The Iraqi experience as well as North Korea illustrate your point pretty well. But the international community still needs to have access to non-military means in which to discipline rouge regimes. You can't just treat a country like Iran in a business as usual manner. Look, you can complain all you want about how messed up US foreign policy is when it came to sanctions in Iraq, but at least our government didn't stoop to the level of France and derive an economic benefit from the oil for food program. France also provided the Khartoum regime with military intelligence and both France and Germany provided helicopters that were used by the regime for ethnic cleansing.

Dominique de Villepin (French Foreign Minister) demanded along with the United States that Iran sign the additional protocols of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003. Iran continues down the path towards nuclear proliferation. The EU was pressuring Iran to comply with the IAEA’s demands by linking the matter to EU’s trade relations with Iran, but France's policies are not in-line with the rest of the EU on that. So we see an inconsistent approach from Europre and an aggressive approach from the US, and Iran continues down the road towards nuclear capability and all the while they fund groups like Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad.