INTRODUCTION OF ECONOMIC SANCTIONS AGAINST IRAN CAN TOUCH UPON SOME SPHERES OF ARMENIAN-IRANIAN COOPERATION, EXPERT CONSIDERS

Noyan Tapan
Armenians Today
Apr 17 2006

YEREVAN, APRIL 17, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. It is not excluded
that possible sanctions against Iran can have a negative impact on the
development of Armenian-Iranian cooperation. Sevak Sarukhanian, expert
on Iran of the Noravank scientific-educational fund, declared this
answering Noyan Tapan correspondent’s question, what impact possible
introduction of economic sanctions against Iran can have on Armenia. As
he estimated, today the world is not ready to refuse supplies of the
Iranian oil. Therefore, possible sanctions against Iran will rather
touch upon other spheres than the oil one, which can have a negative
impact on some sides of Armenian-Iranian economic cooperation and,
in particular, trade between the two countries. According to the
expert, the beginning of discussion of the issue on introduction
of sanctions against Iran by the European Union is an integral part
of the political pressure exerted by the world on Iran today. Seven
Sarukhanian did not exclude that today for EU it is not beneficial to
introduce any sanctions against Iran as in difference to U.S., today
Europe directly depends on supplies of the Iranian oil. In addition,
in his opinion, the sanctions can do harm the dialogue that started
between IRI and EU on the issue of perspective supplies of the Iranian
gas to Europe. The expert considers that for the present, introduction
of sanctions against Iran by U.S. and a group of countries at one
with U.S. is more realistic. Some members of EU can also appear among
them. However, EU as an orga nization will hardly introduce sanctions
against IRI, especially forestalling the UN Security Council.