"Our colleagues here [in Brussels] sometimes ask why Russia and China do not create their own INSTEX [Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges]. To that we answer with the question: why do we need it? We have already traded and will trade without paying any attention to US sanctions," Chizhov said.
The day before, the Finnish government said that it was considering joining a trading system that core EU members set up to bypass US sanctions on Iran.
Last year, the United States reimposed sanctions on Iran’s financial and energy sectors that were initially waived under a 2015 nuclear deal.
In January, France, Germany and the United Kingdom set up INSTEX in order to ease non-dollar trade with Tehran in the wake of these sanctions. Following a meeting of the Joint Commission of the Iranian nuclear deal in June, the mechanism became operational and available to all EU member states.
