Baku, Azerbaijan, Dec.3
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
The Central Bank of Iran has sent a delegation to India to discuss ways of paying Iran's petrodollars which have been held in India as a result of international sanctions against Iran's financial system, the Fars News Agency quoted Tehran chamber of commerce chairman Yahya Al-e Es'haq as saying on December 3.
During the visit India in the past week, it was decided that a delegation from Iran's Central Bank be sent to India to discuss ways of unblocking Iran's petrodollars, he said.
India was paying for 45 per cent of its purchases of Iranian crude in euros until February with the money going through the Ankara-based Turkish Halkbank because of the European Union sanctions against Tehran. Since then Indian crude oil importers have withheld their payments.
Iran explored the option of accepting payment in Russian roubles and other currencies, but the routes could not be finalised. After the rupee transactions were left as the only alternative, the UCO Bank had been designated as the only Indian institution under the rupee payment mechanism with Iran.
"We probably imported $5 billion worth of crude oil from Iran. Of this, we may have to pay $2-2.5 billion to the Iranian oil companies,'' India's Oil Secretary Vivek Rae said on Nov. 27.
India is among Asia's major importers of energy and relies on Iran to meet a portion of its energy demands. Iran was the second largest supplier of India's crude before unilateral sanctions were imposed on Tehran about two years ago.