Baku, Azerbaijan, March 16
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
Iranian telecommunications minister Mahmoud Vaezi has criticized Samsung for cutting the access to Samsung's mobile app store for Iranian users, ISNA reported on March 16.
Mahmoud Vaezi said Samsung should resolve the problem as soon as possible.
Representative of Samsung in Iran has pledged to resume the service as of April 6, 2014, Vaezi added.
Iranian device users lost access to Samsung's mobile app store as of May 22, 2013.
The Korean electronics giant said that it couldn't provide access to the store because of 'legal barriers'. Many sanctions have been imposed on Iran over its nuclear program, and Samsung's step is viewed as the latest such measure.
Unlike Apple, Microsoft and Adobe, Samsung provided localized services to Iranians in Persian language. It also isn't the first handset vendor to pull back from Iran. Nokia stopped its services in the country last year.
On June 9, 2013, the Tasnim News Agency quoted Tehran Chamber of Commerce member Mohammad-Hossein Barkhordar as saying that Samsung will lift ban on Iranian users to access app store sooner or later.
Samsung took the decision in order to show off in the international arena, but it retreated from the decision and found out that it was wrong, Barkhordar said.