Iran Set to Regain UN Vote Soon

Iran’s delinquent dues to the United Nations have been paid with its frozen funds in South Korea and the country is expected to regain its vote at the world body’s General Assembly early next week, UN ambassador Majid Takht-Ravanchi confirmed on Sunday. 
“As soon as the sum is received at New York, the vote must naturally be retained at the beginning of the week,” he was quoted as saying by ISNA. 
Iran lost its voting rights this month because it could not transfer money to pay its dues as a result of American sanctions.
It asked South Korea last week to help pay the UN contribution with the frozen assets. 
Seoul on Friday completed the payment of dues of about $18 million through the blocked funds, “in active cooperation with related agencies such as US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and the United Nations Secretariat,” the South Koran finance ministry said in a statement.
A similar payment had also earlier helped Tehran regain its voting right in June.
Iran has about $7 billion of its funds blocked in South Korean banks under US sanctions which it has repeatedly demanded to be released, saying Seoul was holding the money “hostage”.

Iranian total frozen assets in international accounts are calculated to be worth between $100 billion and $120 billion. 
Besides the $7 billion in South Korean banks, $6 billion is blocked in Iraq, $20 billion in China, $1.5 billion in Japan and 1.6 billion in Luxembourg, as well as almost $1.973 billion in the US itself. 
The release of Iranian frozen funds requires the approval of Washington which has reimposed sweeping sanctions on Tehran following its withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear deal three years ago. 
Iran waited for a year for other parties to offset the effects of American bans, but was forced eventually to reciprocate by rolling back on its nuclear commitments under the agreement, formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. 
Negotiations have been underway in the Austrian capital Vienna since April to restore the JCPOA by working out ways for both sides to resume compliance. 
Tehran demands the effective and verifiable removal of sanctions before reversing its measures, as well as guarantees that no future US government would violate the deal again.
While Iran maintains that it would negotiate for as long as needed to uphold the rights of its nation, western parties have been warning that time is running out for the revival of the deal. 
The US this week joined its European allies in saying only weeks remain to salvage the JCPOA. 
“There is real urgency and it’s really now a matter of weeks, where we determine whether or not we can return to mutual compliance with the agreement,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said after meeting with European allies in Berlin on Thursday. 
He told reporters, however, that reviving the landmark agreement remained possible.
US President Joe Biden also said this week that it was “not time to give up” on the talks with Iran, insisting “there is some progress being made” in the Vienna discussions.