South Korea used 18 million dollars (a little less than 16 million euros) of Iranian funds frozen in Korean banks to settle arrears from Tehran to the budgets of the United Nations (UN), announced , Sunday January 23, Seoul, which will allow Iran to quickly recover its right to vote in the United Nations. This payment was made Friday in cooperation with the United States and the United Nations, following Iran had “requested urgently” South Korea to pay the amount due, the South Korean finance minister said in a statement.
“Payment of Iran’s UN contributions (over $18 million) has been made”, confirmed the Iranian diplomatic mission to Agence France-Presse in New York. As of Friday, UN sources had indicated that this sum had been released in Seoul to settle the UN. This amount was the minimum of the arrears owed by Tehran to the United Nations to be able to recover its right to vote within the Organization, lost at the beginning of January.
Iran has more than $7 billion in funds earmarked for oil exports, frozen in two South Korean banks due to US sanctions. “Iran’s right to vote in the UN General Assembly should be immediately restored with this payment”, the South Korean ministry added.
A similar situation last year
Iran was South Korea’s third-largest trading partner in the Middle East before the United States unilaterally withdrew from a 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers and reimposed trade-crippling sanctions. Article 19 of the Charter of the United Nations provides for the suspension of the right to vote in the General Assembly for any country whose amount of arrears is equal to or greater than the contribution owed by it for the past two full years.
On January 11, the UN Secretary General announced that Iran would have to pay $18.4 million to recover its right to vote. Last year, Iran had already lost its right to vote due to non-payment. Tehran had claimed that it might not honor the minimum required for its debts to the UN because of the economic and financial sanctions imposed by the United States.
After several months of negotiations, Tehran was able in June to use funds blocked in South Korea to pay the minimum debts required and recover its right to vote, just before the election of new members to the Security Council of the UN.