Iran says it hopes South Korea, Japan will release $1 billion in blocked funds
Iran expressed hope on Tuesday that South Korea and Japan would agree to release about $1 billion of Iranian funds frozen in the two countries because of U.S. sanctions, but South Korea said it still needed to discuss the matter with the United States.
Iranian government spokesman Ali Rabiei said central bank
governor Abdolnaser Hemmati had reached preliminary agreements with the
ambassadors of Japan and South Korea on the fund releases.
"He (Hemmati) has said that it seems that, in a first
step, about $1 billion of foreign exchange resources of the Central Bank of
Iran will be provided to us," Rabiei told a news conference streamed live
on a government website.
But in Seoul, a South Korean foreign ministry official told
reporters: "The actual unfreezing of the assets will be carried out
through consultations with related countries, including the United
States."
Iran has repeatedly demanded the release of about $7 billion
of its funds frozen in South Korea and $3 billion in Japan. But Tehran has
denied that its seizure of a South Korean ship for alleged environmental
pollution on Jan. 4 was linked to the dispute.
Iranian officials have sought ways of setting up channels to
allow Tehran to use the funds blocked in Japan and South Korea to buy
humanitarian goods.
The United States reimposed sanctions on Iran in 2018 after
then President Donald Trump withdrew Washington from Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal
with six major powers. Under that deal, Iran had agreed to curb its nuclear
work in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.
Iran has retaliated by bypassing the restrictions of the
deal step by step, in a move that has complicated efforts by U.S. President Joe
Biden to rejoin the deal.
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