TEHRAN, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- An Iranian deputy foreign minister on Friday criticized what he called the "slow" pace of the European Union (EU) in developing mechanism to keep Iran's trade with its European partners amid the recent U.S. full-scale sanctions.
"Their political stances (against the U.S. sanctions) have been very good," Abbas Araqchi said. But "they have so far failed to bring about operational approaches and meet our expectations."
Araqchi was alluding to the EU's impending legal entity to facilitate legitimate financial transactions with Iran in the face of U.S. sanctions.
"It is a fact that the Europeans moved much slower than we expected" in the direction of introducing the mechanism, Araqchi was quoted as saying by Press TV.
He expressed the hope that "in a very near future, this mechanism will be announced and will be formally registered in Europe."
Washington withdrew from Iran's landmark 2015 nuclear deal in May and imposed second batch of sanctions against Tehran on Monday, targeting Iran's shipping, financial and energy sectors.
Iran relies heavily on Europeans' assistance against the U.S. pullout of the nuclear deal and their promises to guarantee Iran's interests predicted under the 2015 accord.
The EU has stressed that it would set up a legal entity to facilitate legitimate financial transactions with Iran in light of the U.S. withdrawal from the international agreement.
The legal entity will allow European companies to continue to trade with Iran in accordance with the EU law and could be open to other partners in the world, Federica Mogherini, the EU foreign and security policy chief, said in September.
