ICJ to hear Iran's challenge against US sanctions on Monday
Iran's legal challenge against renewed sanctions by the United States goes before the UN's top court Monday.
Tehran filed a suit against US President Donald Trump's decision to reimpose economic sanctions at the Hague-based International Court of Justice last month, AFP reported.
After unilaterally pulling out of a historic hard-won deal on Iran's nuclear program in May, Trump slapped a first round of sanctions on Iran in early August.
And a second round is set to come into effect in early November, this time trying to block Iran's oil and energy sales.
But Tehran argues that Washington has no right to reinstate such measures and is calling on the ICJ to order the US to 'immediately suspend' them.
It is also demanding compensation.
The ICJ is expected to take a couple of months to decide whether to grant Tehran's request for a provisional ruling, while a final decision in the case could actually take years.
International sanctions against Iran were lifted in 2015 when it struck a landmark accord with the US, Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, agreeing to put limits on its nuclear ambitions.
But Trump claimed it as a horrible one-sided deal.
And even though all of the other parties pleaded with him not to abandon the pact, Trump pulled out and announced he would reinstate sanctions.
Tehran also says that the move violates the Treaty of Amity and Economic Relations signed by the two countries in 1955.
A raft of international companies – including France's Total, Peugeot and Germany's Siemens and Daimler – have already suspended operations in Iran in the wake of the US move.
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