“It’s time to act,” CBI Chief Abdolnaser Hemmati told IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva in an article published on Sunday, reminding the IMF that Iran, the US, and Europe have all lost many people due to the outbreak of the coronavirus.

Deploring the US’ interference in the administration of the IMF, Hemmati proposed that the IMF can pay Iran the loan directly via the INSTEX –a financial mechanism that the three European parties to the 2015 nuclear deal have established for trade with Iran- or via the Swiss Humanitarian Trade Arrangement (SHTA), so that the loan could be used for purchases from pharmaceutical and food companies.

“These channels have been specially established to help buy foodstuff and medicine. These channels have appropriate security mechanisms that would allay all concerns,” Hemmati added.

Last week, the top Iranian banker had emphasized that the IMF loan is totally unconditional and must be given immediately.

The only guarantee that needs to be given relates to the period of repayment, Hemmati said, stressing that the loan is Iran’s natural right, as the country has kept reserve assets in the IMF and has not received any loan over the past 60 years.

Earlier this month, President Hassan Rouhani said it would be unacceptable for the International Monetary Fund to unfairly refuse Iran’s application for the loan that it needs for the fight against the coronavirus.

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A European payment system set up by Germany, France, and the UK for trade with Iran, INSTEX ‎has been designed to circumvent US sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

In a Twitter post on Tuesday, the German Federal Foreign Office announced, “France, Germany and the United Kingdom confirm that INSTEX has successfully concluded its first ‎transaction, facilitating the export of medical goods from Europe to Iran. INSTEX and its Iranian ‎counterpart STFI will work on more transactions and enhancing the mechanism.” ‎

An Iranian structure parallel to INSTEX, the Special Trade and Finance Institute (STFI)‎ was launched in March 2019, by a group of the Iranian state and private banks to match the European mechanism.

In May 2018, President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), ‎signed between Iran and the P5+1 in July 2015, and reimposed Washington’s unilateral sanctions on ‎Tehran. The sanctions have hindered, among many other things, the delivery of international humanitarian ‎aid, drugs, and medical equipment to Iran, particularly, now that the country is fighting against the ‎coronavirus. ‎

By setting up the INSTEX payment mechanism, the three European states aimed to safeguard Iran’s interests within the framework of the JCPOA and, thus, preserve the deal, a goal they have, in practice, failed to achieve so far.

Over the past two years, Iran has repeatedly criticized Europe for failing to honor its pledges under the JCPOA ‎and retaliated by scaling back from its own commitments under the deal.

Tehran has, however, vowed to reverse all its nuclear responses as soon as the other JCPOA signatories begin fully implementing their nuclear obligations, describing the INSTEX as just a prelude to the implementation of Europe’s 11-fold commitments under ‎the JCPOA.‎

US officials have repeatedly expressed their dissatisfaction with the mechanism, calling on European states to refrain from joining it. Defying US anger at the system, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden joined it in late 2019.

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In a video released on Sunday, Netanyahu said European countries “should be ashamed of themselves” for pursuing trade with Iran, claiming that they were enabling Tehran “to develop nuclear weapons”.

Last week, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden announced that they would join a non-dollar trade mechanism with Iran.

Britain, France, and Germany announced the establishment of the system, officially called the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX), in January.

The apparatus is expected to circumvent the sanctions that the United States began reimposing against Iran after leaving a nuclear deal with Tehran, the European trio, and Russia and China.

Hours after his statement, Netanyahu spoke with US President Donald Trump on the phone and discussed the alleged “threat from Iran”.

Iran was in compliance of the 2015 international agreement until the US pulled out of the deal in May last year and reimposed economic sanctions.

European signatories to the deal have sought to find ways to help Tehran evade the US restrictions. Iran is increasing the pressure on Europe to do so, by gradually walking away from its nuclear commitments.

The decision of six Europeans for joining INSTEX was apparently taken to pacify the Islamic Republic which has said its patience is over after a year of living under the US sanctions.

In May, Iran initiated a set of countermeasures against Washington’s withdrawal from the nuclear agreement, and the Europeans’ failure to guarantee Tehran’s business interests under the accord.

The countermeasures have seen Tehran surpass the 3.67-percent cap set by the deal on the level of its uranium enrichment, and the 130-tonne ceiling placed on its heavy water reservoir.

Iran had accepted the limits voluntarily as part of the deal, despite not being obligated by the UN nuclear agency to commit to any such restrictions.

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“This mechanism is by no means a banking system in which money is supposed to be transferred, but rather a mechanism for trade exchanges in the form of bartering, and Europe’s goal is not to involve its banks.” the official explained.

Modoudi further noted that Iran’s foreign trade is mainly conducted with neighboring countries, and almost 85 percent of the country’s exports are to those neighbors plus China and India.

“That is why we do not have much dependence on Europeans. Even the share of East Asian countries in the remaining 15 percent of Iranian foreign trade is much more than that of Europe’s,” he added.

Elsewhere in his remarks, the TPO head mentioned INSTEX potential advantages for EU, saying “Europe’s exports to Iran are about 10 times higher than Iran’s exports to Europe, and it is clear that this mechanism would be more in favor of the European nations rather than in line with Iran’s interests.”

“By implementing INSTEX, the Europeans could at least maintain the flow of their own exports to Iran,” he said.

He finally pointed to Iran’s current trade and noted that the country’s current annual trade stands at nearly $50 billion, and this level of trade has been achieved without INSTEX.

According to the official, Iran is currently using a same mechanism for conducting trade with its neighbors and even if the INSTEX is not operational the impact on the country’s foreign trade wouldn’t be that significant.

More than a year ago, in May 2018, U.S. President Donald Trump formally pulled the United States out of the nuclear deal that was struck between Iran and world powers in July 2015.

Following Trump’s decision, in January 2019, France, Germany and Britain (known as the E3) introduced an Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX) which was meant to facilitate legitimate trade between European economic operators and Iran in order to convince Iran to stay in the 2015 nuclear deal.

Since then, several rounds of talks were held and hundreds of hours of discussion were done on the subject. The Europe claimed many times that “the mechanism will be operational soon”, however so far the EU claims have been no more than a bunch of empty promises.

The Europeans’ repeated false promises finally worn Iran’s patience thin, so that earlier this month, Iran officially announced it will take the second step in reducing its commitments to the JCPOA, as the deadline Tehran set for the Europeans to protect Tehran against the U.S. sanctions ended on July 7.

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