ANKARA
U.S. aerospace giant Boeing has sold airplane parts to Iran Air, national flag carrier of Iran, for the first time since the 1979 hostage crisis between Iran and the US, the company affirmed.
"During the third quarter of 2014, we sold aircraft manuals, drawings, and navigation charts and data to Iran Air," Boeing’s quarterly report stated.
The company also stated in the report that it generated approximately $120,000 in gross revenues and $12 thousand net profits during the third quarter from the deal to Iran.
Iran has an aging fleet of U.S.-made Boeings purchased before the 1979 Islamic revolution. The country used to buy passenger planes from the U.S. and Europe before the revolution, but this process came to an end after sanctions were imposed on its aviation industry in 1979.
In April of this year, the US government issued a license allowing Boeing to provide aircraft spare parts that are for safety purposes to Iran. Boeing is still not allowed to sell new planes to Iran.
The company said the parts were purchased "consistent with guidance from the US government in connection with ongoing negotiations between the “P5+1 nations”-– the U.S., Britain, China, Russia, France and Germany – and Iran related to, among other things, the safety of Iran’s civil aviation industry."
The company added that it may engage in additional sales to Iran in the future.
In November 1979, months after the establishment of the Islamic republic, Iranian students stormed the US embassy in Tehran and took 52 diplomats hostage and held them captive for 444 days. After the incident US applied tough sanctions to Iran and lasting until today.
Talks between Iran and the P5+1 have led to a deal calling for Tehran to scale back its nuclear activities in exchange for the easing of economic sanctions. The talks have been running since last November.
World powers suspect Iran has not been honest about its nuclear programme and is seeking the ability to build a nuclear bomb.
Iran says it has the right to nuclear energy - and stresses that its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only.
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