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change the fact that the world is sick & tired of US unilateralism."
He added: "Stopping US trade and killing 100K US jobs is fine with us, but the world won't follow impulsive tweeted diktats. Just ask EU, Russia, China & dozens of our other trading partners."
Zarif noted that the big European pow- ers were asking other countries to also continue purchasing Iranian oil. The
compared with April, the last month before Trump announced the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal and the reimposing of heavy sanctions.
Iran’s fleet of very large crude carriers, or VLCCs, and Suezmax tankers – the largest that can fit fully-laden through the Suez Canal – has always played an important role in delivering Iranian crude to customers, but its importance is increasing as insurers and interna-
“There is hesitation among buyers around continuing to purchase Iranian crude”
UK, France and Germany are aligned with fellow nuclear deal signatories Russia and China who say there is no need for Trump’s sanctions campaign because the accord that the US presi- dent walked out of in early May is working well.
The major EU nations, Zarif added, have also proposed setting up accounts for the Central Bank of Iran in their national banks to help Iran get around US restric- tions on its use of US banknotes and financial channels connected to the US financial system. "As a result of these measures, the US has been isolat-
ed," Zarif said.
Early impact of sanctions
shown by shipping
Despite Zarif’s confidence and defiance, ship-tracking data compiled by Bloom- berg showed on August 8 that, although it is still nearly three months until the US sanctions targeting Iran’s crude exports snap back into force, they are already having a big impact on the Persian Gulf country’s oil trade, even where neigh- bour Turkey is concerned.
Iran’s oil outflow has fallen and the country is having to rely more on its own fleet of tankers to carry oil to its customers.
Iran’s exports of crude and condensate – a form of light oil extracted from
gas fields – were down by 430,000 barrels a day, or 15%, in July
tional shipping companies react to the sanctions snap-back, the news agency reported. In April, vessels belong-
ing to the National Iranian Tanker Co. (NITC) were hauling a little under half of the country’s crude and condensate exports. By last month that share had risen to around two-thirds.
“This clearly shows there is hesitation among buyers around continuing to pur- chase Iranian crude with the imple- mentation of these sanctions,” Warren Patterson, commodity strategist for ING Bank, was cited as saying, adding that the dip in flows will probably result in tighter supply of oil.
Under the previous sanctions on
Iran that applied before the nuclear deal took effect in January 2016, all crude deliveries from Iran to Turkey were made on ships belonging to NITC. That began to change in mid-2016, after those sanctions were lifted, and from September of that year it became rare to see Iranian-owned tankers passing through the Red Sea and Suez Canal to Turkey.
Now that picture is switching back again. Last month more crude was loaded
onto Iranian-owned tankers bound for Turkey than at any time since August 2016, the Bloomberg report said.
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