By Xinhua,
Vienna : Iran will withdraw money from European Union (EU) countries and invest in other regions in response to EU sanctions against Tehran, Deputy Foreign Minister Mahdi Safari has said.
In an interview to Austrian newspaper “Die Presse” Wednesday, Safari pointed out that EU’s sanctions would lead to serious consequences.
He believed that once “more than $100 billion” were withdrawn from European banks, it would lead to a money shortage on the continent, which would have an impact on the global economy.
He also mentioned that Iran was enhancing trade with Asian countries. In the past three years, Iran’s trade with Asian countries has reached $85 billion, surpassing the $50-60 billion trade with Western nations.
But he said that Iran was ready for negotiations without any preconditions over the nuclear issue.
“We can talk about the fight against terrorism or organised crimes, we can talk about energy issues, we can talk about the comprehensive settlement of the nuclear issues,” he said in the interview.
On Monday, the EU agreed to impose further sanctions against Iran, including freezing the assets of Iran’s financial institutions and a travel ban on high-level experts dealing with Iran’s nuclear programme. The sanctions formally came into force Tuesday.