The US will decide by the end of June whether to impose sanctions on 12 countries, including India and China, with regard to their purchase of crude oil from Iran, an official said on Tuesday.
It is by the end of June the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton will make a determination on the sanctions, State Department spokesperson, Victoria Nuland told reporters.
The United States is in conversation with these 12 countries on ways and means to avoid the American sanctions against them, she said.
"We are still working with all of these countries and trying to do what we can to help them to reduce their dependence on Iranian oil.
As you know, we have 180 days under this legislation, which takes us into the end of June," Nuland told reporters.
"We have 180 days in the legislation to make a determination one way or the other. So we're continuing to work with them in the intervening period," Nuland said responding to questions on the time line of the determinations against these 12 countries.
In all 23 countries import oil from Iran, last week, the Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, had announced that 11 of these nations - mostly those from Europe and Japan - have been exempted from the Iranian sanctions act because of the significant reduction in oil import from Iran.
The US says it is in talks with the rest of the 12 countries including India, China, Turkey and South Korea in this regard.
Image: The Phase 4 and Phase 5 gas refineries in Assalouyeh, 1,000 kms south of Tehran. | Photograph: Caren Firouz/Reuters
