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Big picture time. Iran has damaged a number of oil tankers in that part of the world in the past couple months. They got caught by the Brit's trying to ship oil that is banded by international sanctions to Syrian interests.

So what is this all about? An attempt at plausible deniability.

Iran needs EU members to not adopt US sanctions. So far it isn't working. Go Trump.

Iran needs to convince those EU countries that they need to back the poorly drafted anti-nuclear expansion plan which required them to drop sanctions against Iran.

This is an attempt for the EU members to say “look Iran is a responsible country, they are fighting independent smugglers who are giving the Iranian government a bad name.”

Iran has a huge economic problem that is going to cause a change in government, unless the sanctions are lifted. The leaders of Iran are fighting for their lives, literally.