China against 'expanding' Iran sanctions
Wed Sep 8, 2010 10:33PM

China has urged Western countries to avoid broadening Iran sanctions by imposing new unilateral sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program.


"China believes that countries should comprehensively and correctly implement the UN sanctions instead of expanding on these sanctions," Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang told a news conference on Tuesday.

After the UN Security Council issued a resolution imposing a fourth round of sanctions on Iran in June, the United States and the European Union followed suit, imposing their own unilateral sanctions.

While the US possesses and has used nuclear weapons in the past, Washington, in a politically-motivated move, has imposed additional sanctions against Iran, which does not possess nuclear weapons nor does it seek to develop such weapons.

On Thursday, the US announced sanctions against an Iranian-owned bank in Germany — Hamburg-based Europaisch-Iranische Handelsbank (EIH) — for facilitating business with Iranian banks.

The move came a day after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called on Washington and the EU to act based on their "mutual responsibility" in the global arena.

"We cannot accept it when in parallel with collective efforts in the UN Security Council partners take unilateral decisions on sanctions, including extraterritorial, which undermine the very basis for further joint action," he said in a speech in Moscow.

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