GENEVA (Dispatches) --
Russia’s Permanent Representative to International Organizations in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov has lambasted South Korea’s freezing of Iran’s funds under U.S. pressure as “piracy in action”.
Ulyanov made the remarks in response to a tweet by Richard Goldberg, a member of the so-called Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), who pointed out that the Central Bank of Iran and the National Iranian Oil Company were designated in the United States under terrorism sanctions authorities.
“Yes, I understand. But that was done illegally, in violation of international law,” Ulyanov said of the U.S. sanctions.
“The Iranian funds were frozen in South Korea as a result of threat to impose sanctions on South Korea. Outrageous. Piracy in action!” he added.
South Korea has said it was waiting for the outcome of ongoing talks in Vienna to revive the 2015 nuclear deal to be able to release more than $7 billion of Iranian funds blocked in the country because of the U.S. sanctions.
The issue of blocked funds has caused enormous dissatisfaction in Iran, with authorities warning that Tehran may reconsider all its energy and trade ties with Seoul if the funds are not repatriated.
Majid Takht-Ravanchi, Iran’s ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations, announced on Saturday that Tehran’s dues were paid to the UN and the country’s voting right should naturally restore at the beginning of the week.
South Korea confirmed on Sunday that it had paid Tehran’s delinquent dues to the UN from the frozen funds.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran, as an active member of the United Nations, has always been committed to paying its membership dues on time and we have proven this in action,” Takht-Ravanchi said.
“Unfortunately, for the second year in a row, we faced the problem of paying our membership fee due to the imposition of brutal and unilateral U.S. sanctions against Iran,” he added.
The United States reimposed its inhumane sanctions against Iran after the administration of former president Donald Trump unilaterally pulled out of the Iran agreement in May 2018.
The U.S. has targeted firms and countries that work with Iran with “secondary sanctions.”