Hamburg, June 10 (DPA) Iran Wednesday blamed its political and economic ally China for having voted in favour of a new United Nations set of sanctions against Iran, ISNA news agency reported.

"Indeed we wonder about the Chinese move at the UN," Iran's nuclear chief Ali-Akbar Salehi told ISNA after China joined the US-backed resolution against Iran.

"China supports North Korea which is not even signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) but adopts a resolution against Iran which is both NPT signatory and all its nuclear projects under the surveillance of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)," he said.

Salehi, who is vice-president and head of the Iranian Atomic Organisation, added that China which once used to call the US a "paper tiger" now followed US-backed resolutions against independent countries.

"This move by China definitely has an (negative) impact among world Muslims and Beijing might gradually lose its respectable status in the Islamic world and wake up when it is already too late," Salehi said.