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US sanctions against Iran will hinder talks over the country's nuclear programme, the Iranian foreign ministry has warned. The comments came as Iran's president, Hassan Rouhani, said the country should "resist" the measures.
On Friday, the US imposed sanctions on more than 25 businesses, banks and individuals it suspected of working to expand Iran's nuclear programme, support terrorism and help Iran evade existing sanctions.
The measures bar Americans from engaging in transactions with any of the designated parties, freeze their assets and block their property under US jurisdiction.
Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Marzieh Afkham said the new sanctions would jeopardise a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, the official IRNA news agency reported on Saturday.
"These actions have a negative and non-constructive impact on the trend of the talks. The Islamic Republic of Iran rejects any unilateral and self-serving interpretation of last year's Geneva deal," she said. "Iran strongly believes that the sanctions are against commitments made by the United States under the Geneva deal."
Rouhani also attacked the sanctions, saying they were an "invasion of the Iranian nation". He said: "We should resist the invasion and put the invaders in their place. We should not allow the continuation and repetition of the invasion."
Iran's state television also said the move violated an interim agreement reached with world powers under which western nations agreed to ease sanctions in exchange for Iran curbing its nuclear activities. However, Friday's action did not constitute an expansion of the sanctions regime, but rather the enforcement of existing sanctions.
Western nations have long suspected Iran of covertly seeking a nuclear weapons capability alongside its civilian programme, a charge denied by Tehran, which insists its programme is for entirely peaceful purposes, like power generation and the production of medical isotopes.
Iran and the P5+1 group of world powers – the US, Britain, France, China and Russia, plus Germany – hope to reach a comprehensive nuclear agreement by November that would address western concerns about the nuclear programme and lift crippling international sanctions on Tehran.
Rouhani, a reputed moderate, was elected last year after promising to engage the west diplomatically in order to get the sanctions lifted. But he has faced criticism from hardliners who say he has conceded too much in the nuclear talks.
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