Page 28 - IRANRptMay19

officials have been working to keep at least one Iranian bank connected to the financial telecommunication system .
Belgium-based SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) did not specify which “certain Iranian banks” it was referring to in its disconnection announcement. The move came as a disappointment to those trying to protect Iran’s trading activities, particularly given the potential disruption the loss of the system could cause to supplying the country with basic foods, medicine and other humanitarian shipments .
Iran’s central bank has claimed the SWIFT disconnection will “have no effect on Iran’s bank accounts and its foreign exchange settlements since it is “only an interbank messaging system”. Its governor Abdolnasser Hemmati told reporters that the regulator had made preparations for the disconnection, but did not explain what alternatives to the system would be employed.
8.1.6 Bank news
India’s IDBI Bank opens Iran trade processing centres in three cities
Standard Chartered hit with $1.1bn in US and UK fines for breaching Iran sanctions
India’s state-run IDBI Bank has opened three centres for processing Iranian trade in Indian cities, the Economic Times reported on April 28. Under its unprecedented sanctions regime imposed on Iran, Washington has demanded that all buyers of Iranian oil stop their purchases by May 1. India, Turkey and China are the three countries most affected by the removal of oil waivers as part of Washington’s maximum pressure campaign against Tehran. The trade nod from the Indian authorities will be of some help to Iran which is suffering heavily under the weight of the heavy US sanctions targeted at vast swathes of its economy.
"IDBI Bank will shortly start setting up processing cells in Delhi, Ahmedabad and Kolkata. The bank already has a centre in Mumbai. The Indo-Iran trade settlements can be done at any of IDBI's branches, and these three centres will be the processing units," a senior bank source reportedly said.
"Direct payments can be routed through the Iranian banks when a trader checks out with his IDBI Bank account number,” they added.
According to the new Iranian-Indian jointly controlled mechanism, Iranian banks will open “Vostro” accounts with IDBI Bank in India, and payments by Indian importers will be deposited into those accounts in rupees.
In turn, Iran is expected to purchase products and items from India in rupees to avoid any direct contravention of US sanctions aimed at any use of the US dollar.
IDBI is the second Indian bank permitted to deal with Iranian trade. UCO became the first earlier last year.
India’s joint development of Iran’s sole oceanic port, Chabahar on the Gulf of Oman, under a long-term lease, has been given a sanctions waiver from Washington officials mindful of its value to securing trade flows and economic growth for war-stricken Afghanistan.
London-based Standard Chartered has agreed to pay $1.1bn to US and British authorities for conducting financial transactions that violated sanctions against Iran and other countries, government officials announced on April 9.
Some of the transactions occurred not long after Standard Chartered settled similar charges in 2012. The settlement extends by two years a deferred prosecution agreement that the bank originally entered into in 2012. Standard Chartered “undermined the integrity of our financial system and
28 IRAN Country Report May 2019 www.intellinews.com