Indian Refiners pay $400 million to Iran under interim deal

Indian refiners paid $400 million to Iran ahead of deadline of the interim deal with six world powers that allows Tehran to recover part of its overseas frozen oil revenues.

Essar Oil paid about $201 million, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd about $154 million, Indian Oil Corp about $42 million and Hindustan Petroleum about $3 million.

With this, India has paid $1.3 billion to Iran in three installments under the interim deal, which allowed Tehran access to $2.8 billion of its funds held in foreign banks in addition to $4.2 billion paid between January and July.

Western powers and Iran are in talks to hammer out a final deal to ease sanctions against Tehran in exchange for curbs to its nuclear programme.

Iran has said it would resist Western pressure to make what it considered to be excessive concessions in nuclear talks, highlighting obstacles that could prevent a historic deal being reached.

Tony Blinken, US Deputy National Security Adviser said it appears difficult to reach a comprehensive nuclear deal with Iran but it is not impossible.

The latest payments would be made using an existing mechanism of a series of back-to-back transactions in different currencies that are initially channeled through the Reserve Bank of India. Iran will eventually get paid in dirhams from the central bank of the United Arab Emirates.

India, Iran’s top oil client after China, has imported 40.3 percent more oil from Tehran in the first 10 months of this year than in the same period last year.