MNA – South Korea has stopped its exports of medicine and related products to Iran, an official from Medical Equipment Department of Iranian ministry of health and education announced on Tuesday.

Condemning the nonhumanitarian act of the South Korean government, Gholam Hossein Mehralian said “according to our made investigations, the South Korean government has stopped its exports of medicine and related raw materials to Iran.”

“Despite Iran’s forex resources in South Korea, the country has taken this nonhumanitarian measure in the wake of the US sanction,” he said.

In mid-August, Iranian Minister of Health and Medical Education Saeed Namaki said that Iran is now producing 97% of its drugs and the remaining 3% will also be manufactured inside the country within the next three years.

“Currently 97% of Iran’s required medicine is produced by domestic companies and only 3% are being imported,” he said.

Despite US sanctions on Iran, which were imposed after Washington unilaterally withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal, pharmaceutical industries have made impressive progress, meeting the needs for almost all of the required drugs in the country. At the same time, the very same sanctions have created some problems for some Iranian patients as foreign companies don’t sell medicine to Iran in fear of US sanctions. US claims that it has not imposed sanctions on medicine but, in practice, it is affecting the Iranian patients.

Foreign Minister Zarif said in early June that “Economic Terrorism against Iran targets innocent civilians. Like this little boy, whose heartbroken mother can't get him prosthetic legs as he grows. They're sanctioned.” His post included the video of a mother who says the US sanctions have made the prosthetic limbs almost unobtainable in the market.