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EU Court lifts sanctions on Iranian oil tanker firm

08 October 2014 [12:50] - TODAY.AZ

By Sara Rajabova

The European Union Court has removed sanctions on Iran's main oil tanker firm, the National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC).

In July, the Luxembourg-based General Court ruled there were no grounds to blacklist the NITC after the company contested the legality of the sanctions, Press TV reported.

"We are glad to see the European Council accept the judgment of the EU court that the sanctions were unlawful, although it is regrettable that they did not see fit to lift the sanctions sooner," Rovine Chandrasekera of law firm Stephenson Harwood, which represented the NITC, said on October 7.

The U.S. and EU imposed sanctions on Iran's oil and financial sectors at the beginning of 2012 under the pretext of potential deviation toward non-civilian purposes in Iran's nuclear energy program. Iran has repeatedly denied the Western allegations against its nuclear energy program.

The sanctions are aimed to prevent other countries from purchasing Iranian oil and conducting transactions with the Central Bank of Iran. At the end of 2012, the EU foreign ministers reached an agreement on another round of sanctions against Iran.

NITC Managing Director Ali Akbar Safaei has recently said during 70 days of moratorium, the EU did not appeal to the European General Court's ruling calling for lifting of sanctions against the NITC. Therefore, this company has been definitely removed from the list of European Union's sanctions.

He further added that the main accusation against the NITC was that it is considered as a government company and in the service of Iran's oil exports.

Safaei went on to note that this accusation was not right, therefore the company took the necessary measures through a legal lawyer and referred to Europe's General Court in Luxemburg and presented its evidence.

However, an EU official told Reuters, "The time for appeal had elapsed but work is still ongoing on remedial action for maintaining the entity on the list."

Recently, The British Treasury has announced the lifting sanctions on frozen assets of five Iranian entities and an Iranian businessman.

The new developments come as Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council - Russia, China, France, Britain and the U.S. - plus Germany held their latest round of talks in New York on September 18-26 to work out a final agreement aimed at ending the longstanding dispute over Tehran's civilian nuclear energy program before a November 24 deadline.

Last November, Iran and the P5+1 clinched an interim nuclear accord, which took effect on January 20 and expired six months later. However, they agreed to extend their talks until November 24 as they remained divided on a number of key issues.


/AzerNews/

URL: http://www.today.az/news/regions/136891.html

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