Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent addresses journalists in Paris on March 16, 2026. Ludovic Marin / AFP via Getty Images
PARIS—U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent used this week’s G7 finance ministers’ meeting in Paris to press Washington’s allies to intensify the economic campaign against Iran. European finance ministers, meanwhile, urged him to help bring the U.S.- and Israeli-led war to an end, warning that its economic fallout was spreading across the continent.
The finance ministers of Germany, France, and Italy, joined by the European Commission, pressed Bessent during a closed-door session on the economic consequences of the conflict. The war with Iran, they said, was driving a surge in oil prices across the European Union, weighing on growth and raising the risk of a food crisis.
