Western oil firms stop business with Iran; UAE freezes bank accounts

The developments underlined the major oil producer's increasing international isolation over a nuclear program it says is aimed at generating electricity but major powers suspect is intended for making bombs.

France's Total joined an expanding list of companies that have stopped gasoline sales to Iran, and Spain's Repsol said it had pulled out of a contract to develop part of the country's huge South Pars gas field in the Gulf.

"Total has suspended its sales of gasoline or refined products to Iran," a company spokesman said in Paris.

The decisions were announced four days after the US Congress approved a bill to penalize firms supplying gasoline to the Iran, which is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter but lacks sufficient refining capacity for its own fuel needs.

The director of the US Central Intelligence Agency, Leon Panetta, speaking in Washington on Sunday, said targeted economic sanctions would probably not deter the Islamic Republic from seeking a nuclear capability.

Panetta also asserted that Tehran had enough nuclear material for two bombs if further enriched.

Iran's hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, dismissed the latest punitive measures, declaring that his country could become self-sufficient in gasoline production "within one week, there is no problem."

He told a Tehran news conference that Iran was prepared to resume nuclear talks with major powers but only after a delay of several weeks to "punish" the West for imposing new sanctions, and with friendly countries included at the table.

"Are they so afraid of two bombs? There are 20,000 bombs stockpiled and they are so afraid of the possibility of the existence of two bombs? This is really amazing," he said.

The UN Security Council has imposed four rounds of sanctions since 2006 over Iran's refusal to halt sensitive uranium enrichment, Kazinform cites Arab News. See www.arabnews.com for full version.