Iranian President Hassan Rouhani highlighted the futility of the US government’s attempts to cut Iran’s oil exports down to zero and said that since the latest batch of economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic took effect, oil exports “have become better”. “The US wanted to block our oil exports but they have become better since […]
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani highlighted the futility of the US government’s attempts to cut Iran’s oil exports down to zero and said that since the latest batch of economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic took effect, oil exports “have become better”.
“The US wanted to block our oil exports but they have become better since November 4 (date of the imposition of latest sanctions),” Rouhani told reporters after a meeting with Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, and Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani in Tehran on Tuesday.
“The oil ministry’s report (on exports) was promising,” he said, adding that the Americans were unsuccessful in terms of significantly reducing Iranian oil sales.
“They also failed at the OPEC summit and the Islamic Republic of Iran gained a success,” Rouhani went on to say.
After two days of talks at the OPEC headquarters in Vienna, OPEC member states and 10 other oil producing nations agreed on December 7 to cut output by 1.2 million barrels a day despite opposition from US President Donald Trump.
The OPEC members are planned to cut their output by 800,000 barrels and non-OPEC members by 400,000 barrels.
The deal, however, has exempted Iran, along with Venezuela and Libya.
The developments come as tensions between Iran and the US have escalated since Trump walked away from the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers in May and re-imposed sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
US officials have repeatedly claimed that they aim to cut Iran’s oil exports to zero.
Following the US exit from the nuclear deal, 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.
