US sanctions against Iran hurting Sri Lanka Wednesday, 01 February 2012 23:47

COLOMBO: US-led sanctions aimed at spurring Iran to abandon its nuclear programme also hurt Sri Lanka, which imports all its oil, the island’s president said yesterday.

Sri Lanka’s only oil refinery is geared to handle Iranian light crude and any disruption to supplies from Iran would be a blow to the island of 20m people, President Mahinda Rajapakse told reporters in Colombo. Iran accounts for 93pc of Sri Lanka’s oil imports.

US officials were expected in Sri Lanka this week to discuss the implications of the sanctions against Iran. “We will ask them to give us an alternative (supply),” said Rajapakse. “They are not punishing Iran, but us -- the small countries.”

Iran was extending seven months’ credit to Sri Lanka to buy crude oil and trade terms were favourable to the tropical resort nation, he said.

India has said it will continue to import oil from Iran, joining China in refusing to bow to intensifying US pressure not to do business with the Islamic republic.

The West fears Iran is trying to build a nuclear bomb. Tehran insists its nuclear programme is only for civilian use and refuses to abandon its uranium enrichment activities. Tehran’s response to recent, severe Western economic sanctions against its finance and all-important oil sectors has been to defiantly ramp up its nuclear activities.

AFP

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