2018-11-06
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran can sell oil as much as it needs despite US pressure, Vice President Ishaq Jahangiri said on Tuesday.
 
The United States on Monday reintroduced sanctions targeting Iran's oil, banking and transportation sectors and threatened to take further action to halt what Washington says are "outlaw" policies and steps Iran has called economic war and vowed to tackle.
 
The measures come as part of broader efforts by US President Donald Trump to curb Tehran's missile and nuclear programs and weaken Tehran's influence in the Middle East, particularly with regard to its support for pro-Syrian parties in Syria, Yemen and Lebanon.
 
Trump's moves are aimed at exporting Iran's oil, the main source of revenue, as well as its financial sector, isolating the operations of 50 Iranian banks and units from foreign banks that fear they will not be allowed to use the US financial system.
 
"The Americans have repeatedly said they will cut Iran's oil sales to zero, but I say that so far we are able to sell the quantities we need to sell from crude," Jahangiri was quoted as saying by the official Tasnim news agency.
 
"The Americans do not see, by propaganda, the facts of things."
 
Jahangiri said he spoke with a group of corporate executives on the US sanctions list, some of whom have already drawn up plans for how to deal with the measures.
 
On the other hand, the governor of the Central Bank of Iran Abdul Nasser Hamati said on Tuesday that banks should benefit from their previous experience in dealing with sanctions to help the economic situation of the country.
 
"Banks, with all their strength, using their expertise from the previous round of sanctions, must take steps to maintain and support foreign trade and remittances," the official IRNA news agency quoted Hamati as saying.
 
Jahangiri said officials should be honest with Iranian citizens regarding the difficulties they might face, the official news agency reported.
 
"We have to keep some concerns for ourselves," he said, "but nothing should be hidden from the people. This is the right of the people. "