Iran's top banker says US bids for economic sanctions to draw zero attention

Iran's top banker said Saturday boycotting Iran's Central Bank "is a political issue" which would draw zero attention from the world. Mahmoud Bahmani, Governor of the Central Bank of Iran, rejected the US bids to impose economic sanctions against Iran in the wake of accusations that Tehran was allegedly behind the failed attempt to kill the Saudi Ambassador in Washington Adel Al-Jubair. Iran denied the accusations. "Any decision to boycott the Central Bank of Iran in the United Nations will be rejected, and international banks and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will not accept these decisions," Bahmani was quoted by semi-official Al-Alam TV news channel. He said the Central Bank of Iran was operating independently from the Iranian government, and thus the boycott was not justified "under the pretext of the fabricated conspiracy of assassinating the Saudi Ambassador." David Cohen, US Treasury Department's top terror finance official, told the Senate Banking Committee on October 13 that Washington would continue its efforts to isolate Iran through sanctions and urged the European allies to cooperate. "Although US financial institutions are already generally prohibited from doing business with any bank in Iran, further US action against the Central Bank of Iran, if it attained multilateral support, could further isolate the CBI with a potentially powerful impact on Iran," he said.