Venezuela calls for removal of US sanctions on Iran

Venezuelan Ambassador to Tehran Amenhotep Zambrano denounced imposition of unilateral sanctions on independent countries by the US and its western allies, and called for the immediate removal of such illegal embargoes on Iran. Zambrano expressed his country’s opposition to imposing sanctions against Iran, saying the US must lift sanctions because it does not have the right to impose such sanctions. The Venezuelan envoy said the time had come for diplomacy and efforts must be must in this direction. 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.