Baku, Azerbaijan, May 5
By Aygun Badalova - Trend:
National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC) is in talks with its Asian customers on switching to euro-based payments in their term agreements, including Japan and South Korea, International Oil Daily (IOD) reported citing a senior company official.
"Talks are under way to receive euros from our Asian customers. The intention is to be paid in euros," the official told IOD.
India is the only customer so far that switched to settling its crude bills with Iran in euros under new term agreements that came into force in April. However, India still has to settle outstanding debt of $6.5 billion to Iran for oil sales during sanctions; New Delhi wants to pay in rupees but Tehran wants to receive the funds in euros.
Some Iranian authorities and media criticized the US, raising concerns that Washington is somehow "blocking" access to banking operations for other countries' companies.
Iranian First Vice-President Eshaq Jahangiri earlier said that although Iran has occasionally carried out transactions with some smaller Asian banks, leading banks are still cautions in trade with Iran under the US pressure.
Earlier this year, it was reported that Iranian banks were being reconnected to Swift's international payments system after a four-year hiatus.
Iran's Central Bank and 15 other banks have restored access to Swift. However, the country is still subject to primary sanctions imposed by the US, sanctions that were not the subject of the nuclear deal.
"The on-boarding process including administrative and technical measures for all non-sanctioned Iranian banks including the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran is now completed," the Central Bank said at the time.