Iran-Korea trade relations is on hands of Seoul
Secretary General of Iran-South Korea Joint Chamber of Commerce Pouya Firouzi urged South Korea to oblige its banks to act on stalled pharmaceutical exports to Iran.
In an exclusive interview with ILNA news agency, he said “The future of business relations between the two countries is now in the hands of Seoul; so their performance will be very effective in exporting medicines and hospital equipment.
“We expect that the Korean government solves the banking problems with special care.”
Firouzi said that sanctions are unacceptable in their entirety and pharmaceuticals are supposed to be exempt from the sanctions, adding “We hope that the South Korean government in a constructive move will persuade its banks, at least to open the way to process payments related to drug exports to Iran.”
Iran's Foreign Minister Zarif says the US sanctions targeting Iran's access to medicines equal economic terrorism.
South Korean pharmaceutical companies claim that there is not any problem in this field but Iran’s major pharmaceutical companies acknowledge that there is serious problem in the field of importing medicines and pharmaceutical raw materials into the country.
According to South Korea's customs, the country's exports to Iran during the past five months have been ten times smaller than the amount in the similar period last year reaching just $148 million.
South Korea is the 5th largest export economy in the world and the 6th most complex economy according to the Economic Complexity Index (ECI).
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