
Tehran’s recent ultimatum to Apple, the US tech giant, to open up an office in Iran or face a ban on Apple products in the country, was presented as a bid to end the loss of tax revenue from millions of iPhones smuggled into Iran, but its real goal is to break through the wall of US sanctions still blocking investment in Iran.
“If [Apple] does not register an official representative office in Iran, all phones produced by this company will be confiscated from stores,” said Abbas Nakhaei, head of the Anti-Smuggling Task Force, in an interview with the hardline Tasnim News Agency on July 17, 2016.
Bringing Apple officially into the country would be a huge victory for Iran, which has argued that the benefits of signing the nuclear deal and the easing of international sanctions have not brought the expected foreign investment into the country.
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