The official was responding to a report in the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday that US Treasury officials disrupted a Dubai-based financing channel for Iran late last year.
The Journal said that Dubai’s Noor Islamic Bank had been a primary conduit for returning foreign-currency oil receipts to Iran, until it agreed in December to halt dealings with Iranian entities that have been sanctioned by the US and the European Union, including Iran’s banks Saderat and Melli.
Asked if other banks in the United Arab Emirates had been targeted by the US, Khalid al-Ghaith, the UAE’s assistant foreign minister for economic affairs, said: “As far as the UAE is concerned, (Noor Islamic Bank) is the only institution.”
Al-Ghaith said UAE officials are in touch with the US on the Iran sanctions issue. “We are committed to international laws, but as far as the US sanctions are concerned, they remain US set sanctions on Iran, and we are in constant talks and discussions with them.”
Noor Islamic Bank has confirmed it had ended business dealings with Iranian banks in December.
“As a UAE bank we comply with all UAE central bank and government directives and international regulations, including those emanating from the UN, regarding sanctions on Iran,” a spokesperson said.
“When we became aware, in December 2011, that unilateral US sanctions were to be applied against a number of Iranian banks we took pre-emptive action to end our business relationships with Iranian banks licensed in the UAE,” the spokesperson added.
Meanwhile, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, the emirate’s largest bank by assets, said it is reducing banking activities with Iran amid mounting international sanctions against the country.
“We don’t have very much business with Iran,” Michael Tomalin, the bank’s chief executive, said Wednesday on the sidelines of a conference in Abu Dhabi. “To the extent to which we do, we are reducing our activities with Iran in line with the directions we are following.”
