"Iran Air was advised a week ago that Kent International Airport is no longer willing to supply them with fuel," he said.
The Iran Air fueling arrangements with Manston were picked up by British media including the BBC and the tabloid Daily Mail Online. They come amid a deepening diplomatic rift between the UK and Iran, after protesters stormed the British embassy in Tehran. The UK responded by expelling Iranian diplomats.
A spokesman for New Zealand's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade couldn't immediately comment on the situation.
Sales of jet fuel through Manston were not large enough to breach the sanctions anyway, Fitzgerald said. They restricted fuel sales exceeding US$1 million per transaction and at Manston, the value was well below that, with each sale being for 10s of thousands of litres, he said.
The decision to stop the fuel sales was "based on a view that this was the right thing to do," he said.
Infratil's European Airports posted an EBITDAF loss of 1.8 million pounds in the six months ended Sept. 30, narrowing from a loss of 2.2 million pounds a year earlier.
Infratil's shares rose 0.3 percent to $1.815 on the NZX today and have slipped 6 percent this year.