Spokesman deplores canada trade ban on Iranian goods

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Abbas Araqchi lashed out at the Canadian Government for its recent decision to impose total ban on Iranian goods. Ottawa announced more unilateral sanctions against Iran on Wednesday. Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird said that the trade ban would prohibit the import or export of all Iranian goods. In reply, Araqchi strongly criticized Canada's decision, and said, "These statements are continuation of the Canadian government's projections (against Iran) because we did not have considerable economic relation with this country to be cut off." Washington and its Western allies accuse Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian nuclear program, while they have never presented any corroborative evidence to substantiate their allegations. Iran denies the charges and insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only. Tehran stresses that the country has always pursued a civilian path to provide power to the growing number of Iranian population, whose fossil fuel would eventually run dry. Despite the rules enshrined in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entitling every member state, including Iran, to the right of uranium enrichment, Tehran is now under four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions and the western embargos for turning down West's calls to give up its right of uranium enrichment. Tehran has dismissed West's demands as politically tainted and illogical, stressing that sanctions and pressures merely consolidate Iranians' national resolve to continue the path. Tehran has repeatedly said that it considers its nuclear case closed as it has come clean of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)'s questions and suspicions about its past nuclear activities.