The owner of a takeaway who claimed President Donald Trump's sanctions on Cuba led to £7000 in payments being withheld said the issue has been resolved.

Carlos Arguelles Leblanch, who owns the Cuban Sandwich Factory, said he believed banking software mistakenly identified his business as one which should be subject to recently stepped-up US sanctions.

Many of his customers come through the delivery app Deliveroo. In his case, when an order is placed, payment first goes through Citibank before reaching him, and this, he claimed, is where the issues occurred.

Citibank said: "The matter required a necessary compliance review, which has now been completed, and the payments have been released."

In a statement a Citibank spokesperson said that Arguelles Leblanch's situation "was a particularly nuanced set of circumstances that required additional compliance review", adding that it could not be "directly attributed to an admin error or sanctions related issue".

Cuban Sandwich Factory opened its doors in Belfast in 2012 and two years later began using the Deliveroo platform.

But when Arguelles Leblanch noticed in recent weeks that payments from orders were not arriving in his bank account he said he contacted his representative at Deliveroo and was told it was an issue with the bank, not the platform.

He temporarily suspended all Deliveroo orders because to do otherwise, he said, would "certainly result in the closure" of his business as he would not be able to pay for supplies and staff.

The sanctions mean American banks, like Citibank, have to block any transactions which involve Cuban businesses.

And this is why Arguelles Leblanch thinks his sandwich shop has been inadvertently caught up in the international row.

He said the words 'factory' and 'Cuba' were likely "a trigger" and led to his business being "automatically affected".

"Cuban Sandwich Factory is not related to Cuba. Cuban Sandwich Factory is a company registered in the UK and we never have any connection with the Cuban government," he said.

Arguelles Leblanch said a similar situation arose during Trump's first term as US President, only that time payments were suspended "for three or four months".

To resolve those issues, he said he had to submit proof of residence in Northern Ireland.

"And now it happens again," he added.

Arguelles Leblanch said he does not believe he is being targeted intentionally, but that still "it is not fair".

"I'm from Cuba. This is a Cuban restaurant. We sell Cuban sandwiches," he said.

"I don't believe it's somebody sitting there just picking on me, but it's a system, and the system is created against Cuba."

He said he had to reduce the number of hours offered to his staff while waiting for the situation to be resolved.

In a statement Deliveroo said it was not an administrative issue on their end and referred BBC News NI to Citibank, but added that they they worked closely with both Arguelles Leblanch and Citibank to resolve the issue.

Citibank said: "We empathise with the impact this delay has had on Mr. Arguelles and his business.

"The matter required a necessary compliance review, which has now been completed, and the payments have been released.

"This was a particularly nuanced set of circumstances that required additional compliance review, so I don't think it can be directly attributed to an admin error or sanctions related issue."