The FINANCIAL -- The European Union confirmed Monday that a ban on oil imports from Iran will go ahead as planned on July 1 due to the lack of progress in talks on Tehran's contested nuclear drive.

A statement from EU foreign ministers on the proposed embargo said: "Following a review of the measures the council confirmed that they would remain as approved in January."

According to EUbusiness, after weeks of fraught talks on an embargo that may hurt debt-straddled EU nations such as Greece, the 27-nation bloc agreed on January 23 to immediately ban new oil imports from Iran and phase out existing contracts by July 1.

Confirmation that the embargo will be enforced comes days after talks in MOSCOW between Iran and world powers on its nuclear programme failed to reach a breakthrough.

Negotiators from permanent UN Security Council members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, plus Germany, last week agreed with their Iranian counterparts to stage a new expert-level meeting in Istanbul on July 3.

The West suspects Iran of seeking to make nuclear weapons under the guise of an energy programme and wants it to stop enriching uranium to 20 percent, which brings it dangerously close to levels needed to make a nuclear bomb.

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