U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday pledged to aggressively implement new U.S. sanctions on Iran but noted that some allies such as Japan face "unique situations" as they seek to reduce Iranian oil imports.
President Barack Obama on Dec. 31 signed into law the harshest in a series of U.S. sanctions on Tehran over its nuclear program, targeting foreign financial institutions that do business with Iran's central bank or other blacklisted Iranian financial entities.
The new U.S. sanctions have set off a scramble among countries with significant Iranian oil imports to voluntarily reduce such purchases so they would be exempted from the penalties. (Reuters)
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