Gholamreza Mesbahi Moghadam, a member of the Expediency Council, made the remarks before Tehran Friday prayers on March 8, adding “after the US’ withdrawal (from Iran nuclear deal), Europeans promised they would provide 12 solutions for their trade with Iran, but so far they have not even taken one step in this direction and have not even implemented one single solution.”
He went on to add, “9 months have passed since then, and they have only created a channel called INSTEX, which is not even a financial channel but one for making purchases. Europeans should take note that we will not be deceived by them and endorse the FATF-related bills, because in this case we will consider the Establishment’s benefits, not anyone’s whims.”
Mesbahi Moghadam then referred to FM Zarif and President Rouhani’s positive position on endorsing the FATF-related bills, and their promise that joining the anti-money laundering watchdog, if not making Iran’s trade situation better, would not make it any worse.
“I would say that our situation will actually become worse by acceding to the two conventions (CFT and Palermo). Is it really in our best interests to reveal our foreign trade to countries such as the US, Saudi Arabia or the Zionist regime?”
He leveled more criticism on EU’s trade mechanism for Iran, adding “Europeans are asking us to put our oil revenues into INSTEX in exchange for their selling us food and medicine. They also want us to endorse the FATF-related bills in return for the channel. However, we must not be deceived by them.”
MNA/4562268
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