KUWAIT CITY, Nov 12, (AFP): The Central Bank of Kuwait has asked the country’s banks, investment companies and money exchange firms to start implementing UN sanctions against neighbouring Iran, local media said Friday.

The instructions called for the freezing of assets and financial resources related to “Iran’s sensitive nuclear programmes or activities,” said Al-Rai newspaper, citing a circular by the central bank.
The paper said the circular was based on a letter by the foreign ministry which stressed that the sanctions were mandatory.

In June, the United Nations and world powers imposed a fourth round of sanctions on Iran for refusing to suspend its controversial nuclear programme. The West believes the programme masks an atomic weapons drive but Tehran insists it is peaceful.

The circular bans the opening of branches or representative offices for Iranian banks in Kuwait and forbids Kuwaiti financial institutions from opening offices or accounts in Iran.
The Central Bank asked Kuwaiti financial institutions to exercise caution while making trade transactions with Iran-based establishments, including those controlled by the Revolutionary Guards and Iran’s marine transport company.

Meanwhile, EU diplomacy Chief Catherine Ashton on Friday agreed to resume long-stalled nuclear talks between world powers and Iran on Dec 5, and suggested they be held in Austria or Switzerland.
Ashton’s office said she “has agreed to their proposal to begin talks on Dec 5” and “now looks forward” to meeting Tehran’s chief negotiator Saeed Jailili to discuss the country’s nuclear programme.
Iran this week proposed the talks take place in Istanbul but “Ashton’s preference is that the first meeting take place somewhere else in Europe and has proposed Austria or Switzerland.”
Ashton represents Britain, China, France, Russia, Germany and the United States in the talks aimed at allaying Western concerns that Iran’s nuclear programme is masking a weapons drive under the guise of a civilian programme, something Tehran denies.
In a letter seen by AFP sent to the Iranian side by Ashton’s office, the EU diplomat proposes the talks kick off with a dinner Dec 5 and continue through to midday Dec 7 to have “sufficient time for a full and in depth exchange of views”.
The last round of negotiations deadlocked in October 2009 and Washington this week said there could be multiple meetings and multiple venues.
Tehran’s proposal of Istanbul had been expected to irritate the United States, which views Turkey with mistrust since it set up a nuclear-swap deal with Tehran earlier this year as Washington shored up anti-Iran sanctions.
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday rejected comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calling for a “credible” military threat against Iran to ensure it does not obtain nuclear weapons.
President Barack Obama’s administration, while not ruling out a military option against Iran, has so far stressed sanctions and diplomacy as its preferred course for dealing with the Islamic republic’s nuclear drive.
A European diplomat told AFP this week that aside from dates and venues “the content” of the negotiations remained up in the air.
The New York Times last month said the Western side was preparing a new, more onerous offer for Iran than the one rejected by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last year.
It would require Iran to send more than 4,400 pounds (1,995 kilograms) of low-enriched uranium out of the country, an increase of more than two-thirds from an earlier deal struck in Vienna.
Iran, which frames the talks for its home audience as about global nuclear disarmament, said categorically on Tuesday that it would not discuss the fuel swap during the upcoming negotiations.
The UN atomic watchdog on Friday rejected indirectly an accusation by Iran that it forwarded confidential information about Tehran’s nuclear programme to its arch-enemy the United States.
Asked to respond to the accusation made by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday, International Atomic Energy Agency press officer Greg Webb said the IAEA would not comment directly on the leader’s remarks.
But in an emailed reply, Webb insisted the IAEA “takes great care to protect the confidentiality of information it collects during all its safeguards activities.”
Ahmadinejad in remarks on Iranian state television said world powers were against solving the controversy surrounding Iran’s nuclear programme and accused the IAEA of “giving information” to Washington.
“Accepting the additional protocol means that all our nuclear activities must be under the supervision of the IAEA, which gives information to America,” he said.
Relations between Tehran and the Vienna-based watchdog have deteriorated ever since Japanese diplomat Yukiya Amano took over as director general just over a year ago, with Iran’s envoy to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, becoming increasingly personal in his attacks.