Iran blasts west’s sanctions as violation of international law

Iran's Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Gholam Hossein Dehqani deplored the West's use of economic sanctions against developing countries, specially Iran, for political gains. “Iran firmly believes that the imposition of economic sanctions as a means to exert political and economic pressure on developing countries is a blatant violation of international law and in contradiction to the goals and principles of the UN Charter,” Dehqani said, addressing the Second Committee of the UN General Assembly on Friday. Dehqani underlined that imposing economic sanctions on other states runs counter to independent countries’ right to peace, development and security, and violates the right of nations to trade, free shipping and multilateral commercial system. Washington and its western allies accuse Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian nuclear program, while they have never presented any corroborative evidence to substantiate their allegations. Iran denies the charges and insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only. Tehran stresses that the country has always pursued a civilian path to provide power to the growing number of Iranian population, whose fossil fuel would eventually run dry. Despite the rules enshrined in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entitling every member state, including Iran, to the right of uranium enrichment, Tehran is now under four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions and the western embargos for turning down West's calls to give up its right of uranium enrichment. Tehran has dismissed West's demands as politically tainted and illogical, stressing that sanctions and pressures merely consolidate Iranians' national resolve to continue the path. Tehran has repeatedly said that it considers its nuclear case closed as it has come clean of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)'s questions and suspicions about its past nuclear activities.