Sri Lanka will pay down its oil debt held by Iran with tea in response to new regulations that Sri Lanka has issued in order to comply with a UN Security Council Resolution. The UN resolution calls for the imposition of sanctions on Iran for failing to stop its uranium enrichment program, and restricts financial transactions with Iran. In response to these restrictions, Sri Lanka is hoping to pay Iran in tea—a year’s worth of it. Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC), Sri Lanka’s state-owned oil and gas company, owes Iran about $250 million for oil shipments in recent months. But restrictions on payments limits CPC’s options on how to pay for the oil. The Sri Lanka Tea Board proposed a solution: compensate Iran with tea instead of dollars. The proposal would have the CPC pay for the tea, then the tea would be shipped to Iran. “If the […]