Taiwan Resumes Buying Iranian Oil after 7-Month Moratorium

Taiwan's Bureau of Energy declared that the country's state-owned CPC Corp, a major crude importer, had bought 2 million barrels of oil from Iran that were transferred to the island in November.

Also according to the date released by spokesman of Taiwanese Formosa Petrochemical Corp, another large oil importer, the company had purchased 2 million barrels of Iran's oil that will be loaded by the end of December.

The latest data released by Taiwanese Bureau of Energy demonstrated that Taiwan's crude oil import from Iran hit the highest monthly level in at least 15 months in March, and was 50 percent more than the volume registered for the same period a year earlier.

Also the statistics from the bureau under the Taiwanese Ministry of Economic Affairs, the country purchased 2.96 million barrels of crude oil from Iran in March which reaches 95,581 barrels a day.

The US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, on December 7, added China, India, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Taiwan to the list of the countries exempted from illegal sanctions on Iran for another six months.

The move came in a similar action by the US in September 14, when it exempted Belgium, Britain, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and Japan from abiding by the sanctions on Iran's oil industry for another 180 days.

After the UN Security Council ratified a sanctions resolution against Iran on June 9, 2010, the United States and the European Union imposed further unilateral sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program, mostly targeting the country's energy and banking sectors.

Tehran has always dismissed West's pressures and stressed that sanctions and embargos merely consolidate Iranians' national resolve to continue the path of progress.

The EU measure was ratified at a ministerial meeting in January, but the 27-member bloc deferred its implementation until July 1.

Meantime, Analysts believe that the EU started implementation of the sanctions against Iran at a time when it is experiencing its worst economic conditions.
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