Iran Never Accepts INSTEX’s Humiliating Conditions: Judiciary Chief
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iranian Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani said the country would never accept the “humiliating conditions” of the European Union’s financial mechanism for trade with Iran known as INSTEX, including Iran’s accession to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
“After 9 months of procrastination and negotiation, Europeans have created a mechanism with limited capacity, not for exchanging money but for food and medicine,” Amoli Larijani said, addressing a meeting with high-ranking judicial officials on Monday.
The European countries have reportedly set two “strange conditions” for the mechanism named the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX), he added.
The first condition is that Iran should join the FATF and the other is that the country should enter the negotiations on its missile program, the judiciary chief stated.
“The countries should be aware that Iran will by no means accept these humiliating conditions and will not accede to any demand at the expense of opening a small waterway such as INSTEX,” he went on to say.
Britain, France and Germany on Thursday issued a joint statement on the creation of the INSTEX that will allow trade between the EU and Iran without relying on direct financial transactions.
INSTEX has been registered in France and will be run by German banker and former Commerzbank manager Per Fischer. The new special purpose vehicle will have a supervisory board consisting of diplomats from all three countries: Miguel Berger of Germany, Maurice Gourdault-Montagne of France and Simon McDonald of Britain.
The European Union has vowed to counter Trump’s renewed sanctions on Iran, including by means of a new law to shield European companies from punitive measures.
On May 8, the US president pulled his country out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear deal that was achieved in Vienna in 2015 after years of negotiations among Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany).
Following the US exit, Iran and the remaining parties launched talks to save the accord.
Trump on August 6 signed an executive order re-imposing many sanctions on Iran, three months after pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal.
He said the US policy is to levy “maximum economic pressure” on the country.
The second batch of US sanctions against the Islamic Republic took effect on November 4.