Iran says it has not missed any payments on its World Bank loans, citing international sanctions as the reason why its money is not reaching the global lender.
Behrouz Alishiri, the head of the Iranian Investment Organization, said Iran will contest the World Bank’s decision to designate Iran’s loans as non-performing because payments are six months behind. That designation would deny Iran any further World Bank funding, and its standing with other commercial creditors could be compromised.
On June 30, Iran owed $697 million to the World Bank, and $79,000 of that is now overdue.
Alishiri said Iran forwarded the installments to an intermediary in time to meet the payment, but the third party failed to forward the sum. Alishiri says it all stems from the U.S. and EU sanctions that target banks that deal with Iran’s Central Bank.
