SEOUL (Yonhap) -- South Korea shouldn't feel obligated to comply with the United States' request to impose independent sanctions on Iran and jeopardize its relations with the Middle Eastern nation, Iran's top envoy to Seoul said Monday.

In an interview with Yonhap News Agency, Mohammad-Reza Bakhtiari, the Iranian ambassador to South Korea, said no independent country or member state of the United Nations ""has any more obligation than is being set internationally.""
""They don't have to follow suit if there's a third party asking them to have more restrictions or sanctions unilaterally being imposed upon a member country of the United Nations,"" Bakhtiari said.
South Korea is mulling over sanctions against Iran, as the U.S. is pressuring its allies to join international efforts to put Tehran under pressure for its nuclear program. Iran, which is already under UN sanctions, claims its nuclear program is clean and for peaceful use.
Washington passed its own legislation on sanctions aimed at companies aiding Iran's energy sector and prohibiting U.S. banks from dealing with foreign banks that do business with blacklisted Iranian companies.
Bakhtiari noted that South Korea and Iran will celebrate the 50th anniversary of their diplomatic ties next year and that their bilateral trade has enjoyed an upward trend in recent years, reaching almost US$10 billion last year.
He said Iran has ""full respect for (South Korea's) sovereign decisions"" to handle relations with any third country and it doesn't want to interfere with Seoul's ties with Washington. But he highlighted the importance of ""mutually beneficial"" relations between Iran and South Korea.
Bakhtiari said if South Korea or any other country decides to place sanctions on Iran, they would only be placing sanctions on themselves.
If countries pursue imposing sanctions on Iran, Iran would never sit silent and idle, the envoy said.
Bakhtiari spoke of the high potential of the ""promising"" Iranian market for South Korean companies and said small and medium enterprises (SMEs) will take the brunt of sanctions that would affect business dealings between the two countries.
""(Iran) is open to all those trying to benefit from this huge market,"" he said. ""If anything happened that lowered the level of transactions between Korea and Iran, (SMEs) are the ones that are going to be hit first.""
Bakhtiari also said there are other ""competitive"" companies around the world that are interested in replacing companies about to leave Iran due to sanctions.
""If you take any steps backward in your relations with Iran, Iran is not going to take steps forward toward you,"" the ambassador said.
Bakhtiari also argued that the Seoul branch of the Iranian institution Bank Mellat has not done anything wrong and that the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), the South Korean financial watchdog, has found no illegal activities.
Bank Mellat has been blacklisted by Washington for its alleged involvement in nuclear-related transactions, and Einhorn reportedly asked Seoul to shut it down or freeze its assets.
""There have never been illegal operations done by this bank. Otherwise, it would have been stopped much earlier than this time,"" Bakhtiari said. ""Bank Mellat, like other branches of foreign banks, operates through healthy transactions with your country, with companies of your country, and other domestic banks of Korea.""
Bakhtiari said Bank Mellat is mostly serving those in the Korean business sector here who are ""enjoying the presence of this bank to the benefit of their economic activities.""
""If this is going to be restricted, then all businesses are going to be restricted,"" he said. ""Who's going to lose? That is the question.""
The envoy also claimed Iran has no nuclear ties with North Korea and that such allegations against Iran have ""political motivations"" behind them.
Bakhtiari said he plans to meet South Korean officials at the FSS and the finance ministry ""very soon"" so that South Korean decisions can be ""made properly, based on prudence and rationality.""