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Iran denies ‘emergence of another Babak Zanjani’ in gas condensate sale to UAE

Business Materials 11 May 2015 17:15 (UTC +04:00)

Baku, Azerbaijan, May 11

By Fatih Karimov - Trend: Iran denies 'emergence of another Babak Zanjani' in gas condensate sale to the United Arab Emirates.

Mohsen Ghamsari, director for international affairs at the National Iranian Oil Company, rejected rumors about financial corruption in selling gas condensates, worth $5.3 billion to the UAE, by an Iranian middleman, Iran's IRNA news agency reported on May 11.

After sanctions were imposed against the National Iranian Oil Company, Iran had to export oil and they gave Babak Zanjani the task of exporting some of this oil worth around $3 billion.

In December 2014, Zanjani was accused of initiating an illegal $5.4 billion business deal, hanging on to money from oil sales to the oil ministry and demanding that corruption charges be pursued against him.

Zanjani was arrested days later, and within a week a senior aide was also arrested.

However, Ghamsari said that the National Iranian Oil Company sold condensate directly to the UAE without any middleman involved. "But, due to the international sanctions, the UAE could not transfer petrodollars to Iran by the end of 2013. Through adopting proper policies, $3 billion of the total money was paid in 2014."

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