TOKYO/ SEOUL, May 30: Japan cut oil imports from Iran by 65 per cent in April while boosting shipments from Saudi Arabia, official data showed on Wednesday, amid Western efforts to squeeze Tehran.

In March Japan pledged to further cut its Iranian oil imports, which it said had already shrunk by 40 per cent over the past five years.

South Korea also said on Wednesday its imports of Iranian crude oil would fall this month after a sharp rise in April, in line with international moves to sanction Tehran for its nuclear programme. Official data showed the imports fell 22.2 per cent in the first quarter compared to a year earlier, to 17.73 million barrels. But in April the imports jumped 42 per cent year-on-year to 7.5 million barrels.

The rise was temporary, the Korean Ministry of Knowledge Economy said, and imports by local refiners would decrease in May.

“The government acknowledges the need to reduce imports of Iranian crude oil as a way of participating in international efforts toward a peaceful resolution of Iran's nuclear problem,” it said in a statement.

The EU will ban European firms from insuring or reinsuring tankers transporting Iranian oil anywhere in the world -- a move that could mean Korean refiners are unable to import supplies.

Resource-poor Japan, which relies heavily on Middle East oil, came under pressure earlier this year to curb imports from Iran, with Washington seeking to push Tehran into a corner over what it says is a nuclear weapons programme.

On Wednesday, the trade data showed Japan imported 564,962 kilolitres of Iranian crude oil in April, or about 118,450 barrels a day, a drop of 65.5 per cent from the same month a year earlier.

The figures -- the first full month of data since Tokyo won an exemption from US sanctions against doing business with Iran -- also showed imports from Saudi Arabia jumped 36.4 per cent in the same month to 6.58 million kilolitres.

That is about 1.38 million barrels a day.

Japan and China are Tehran's biggest oil customers, alongside India and the European Union.

Earlier this month, Iran's state-run oil company denied that China and Japan had sharply cut imports of Iranian crude, echoing Tehran's insistence that Western economic sanctions were having little effect.

The United States said it was exempting 11 countries, including European Union members and Japan, from punitive measures on Iran while praising them for reducing dependency on oil from the country. In exchange for the reduction, Tokyo won concessions that would exempt its financial institutions from sanctions on banks that do business with the central bank in Iran, which generally handles oil purchases.

The European Union is poised to fully implement an embargo on Iranian oil from July 1. That could complicate future Japanese imports as the Asian nation's oil firms usually buy insurance domestically for crude shipments, but most of that insurance is sold into European reinsurance markets.—AFP