Russia Eager to Draw on Iran’s Experience to Counter Western Sanctions
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A top Russian financial official voiced Moscow’s willingness to benefit from Tehran’s experience in dealing with the unilateral sanctions imposed by the West.
In a meeting with Iranian Ambasador to Moscow Mahdi Sanaei, Russia’s Deputy Finance Minister Alexei Vladimirovich Moiseev expressed his country’s willingness to draw upon the Islamic Republic’s experience in confronting the West’s unilateral sanctions.
In recent years, the US and its Western allies have slapped cruel sanctions on Iran under the pretext that the country's peaceful nuclear program might have a covert drive towards acquiring a nuclear weapons capability.
Iranian officials assert that the US and some other Western states use the nuclear issue as an excuse to pile up pressure on the Islamic Republic which has faced the US-led sanctions for the past several decades following the victory of the 1979 Islamic revolution in the country.
Iran has been hit with dozens of sanctions in the last ten years. Some of them are based on the UN Security Council resolutions, others are decisions by the European Union, some are acts of the US Congress and still others are executive orders by the US president.
And now Russia’s call for using Iran’s experience in countering sanctions follows Washington’s decision to impose tougher sanctions on Moscow under the pretext that Russia is interfering in Ukraine’s internal affairs.
The US has imposed a series of sanctions on allies of Russian President Vladimir Putin, prompting Moscow to denounce "Cold War" tactics amid escalating violence in eastern Ukraine.
The new round of US sanctions follows those imposed in March when Russia annexed Crimea.
The West has also threatened more far-reaching sanctions that would hit Russia’s important economic sectors.
