TEHRAN – The rapporteur for the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee said on Wednesday that talking about ratifying a bill related to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is not logical when the country is under sanctions. 

“When a part of financial and monetary mechanism worldwide is not capable of working with Iran due to the U.S. sanctions, talking about the FATF is meaningless and ratification of FATF-related bills is model of self-sanctioning, Seyed Hossein Naqavi Hosseini said.  

At the time the JCPOA (the official name for the 2015 nuclear deal) went into force, the signatories were claiming that they had been facing some FATF-related restrictions to fulfill their obligations, the MP said.

“They claimed that FATF’s regulations were preventing them from complying with their JCPOA’s obligations.” 

The MP further said, “The point is here, when the U.S. quit the JCPOA and re-imposed sanctions on Iran and the European signatories of the pact did not fulfill their obligations… and are not still willing to fulfill them, talking about the FATF and the Palermo bill has no logical justification in the country.”

“The U.S. sanctions against Iran are beyond the FATF and Palermo. If we comply with the entire 41 advices of the FATF and ratify the Palermo bill in the Majlis, there will not be any outcome for us but more imposed obligations,” he underscored. 

The MP went on to say, “A part of international financial and monetary mechanism is not working with us. Washington’s secondary sanctions have created barriers on our way. Being in the FATF blacklist or not has no influence on the U.S. sanctions against us.”

Naqavi Hosseini concluded, “Therefore, in such cases neither talking about the FATF nor ratifying Palermo bill will benefit us.”

MJ/PA