Car-making deals, protests greet Iranian president in Paris

French car-maker Peugeot will return to Iran in a partnership deal with a local manufacturer worth 400 million euros ($436 million), according to an agreement signed Thursday during Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s visit to France.

Unlike in Rome, where zealous officials covered naked statues at a museum Rouhani visited, a couple of bare bodies surfaced during his Paris stay.

“Welcome Rouhani, Executioner of Freedom”, read a huge banner across the pedestrian bridge over the Seine River near the Eiffel Tower.

The turnaround came when Iranian diplomats were told that wine was part of French culture and they would have to live with it.

“We will take delivery in 2016 and 2017 of Airbus A320s and A321s, with the A330s coming later”, he said.

He expressed a desire to “turn the page” during the highly-anticipated visit, the first by an Iranian president since 1999.

“I have not received anything”, Zanganeh said at a Franco-Iranian summit in Paris, adding that Iran would sign an agreement with French oil major Total.

Rouhani agreed. He had planned to visit Europe in November to set up deals that he’d hoped to be able to close once the sanctions were lifted, but postponed the tour after the Islamic State attack in Paris on Nov. 13 that killed 130 people.

Supporters of Maryam Rajavi, President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, demonstrate against the Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s visit in Paris, Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2016.

Pierre Gattaz, head of France’s Medef employers association, said he also expected deals to be signed with French railway operator SNCF, and aluminium company Fives.

But there’s also a note of caution, notably about Iran’s human rights record and geopolitical goals.

France’s Peugeot carmaker signed a deal with Iran’s Khodro to modernize its plant and once again begin producing Peugeot vehicles in the previously sanctioned country.

He was due to dine with President Francois Hollande at an upmarket restaurant in the French capital.

Rouhani, speaking to French executives, urged efforts to unblock financing for resumed trade now that sanctions over Iran’s nuclear program have been lifted.

But Rouhani denied he had asked his Italian hosts to cover up the statues and Italian Culture Minister Dario Franceschini, who accompanied Rouhani on the museum trip, called the move “incomprehensible”.

Paris also wants to draw Tehran into a role as peacemaker in a Middle East that is fraught with civil war in Syria, where Iran has played an active role in support of President Bashar Assad, and in Yemen.

Iranian officials have said they are poised to agree on a deal for Airbus aircraft. Iranian officials did not request the statues be covered up but were said to appreciate the gesture.

France’s biggest lender BNP Paribas (BNPP.PA) was fined $8.9 billion in the United States a year ago for past sanctions-busting against countries including Iran. “We can open a new chapter”, he said, addressing Rouhani.

In a reference to Saudi Arabia, the Iranian president told an audience in Paris that “some countries had wanted to use terrorism for their own means”.