JEDDAH: A Saudi-based coalition that combats terrorist financing imposed new sanctions on Wednesday targeting 25 companies, banks and individuals linked to Iran’s support for extremist groups throughout the Middle East.
The new measures are aimed in particular at militant networks associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and will tighten controls on both groups’ finances.
The sanctions were imposed by the Terrorist Financing Targeting Center (TFTC) in Riyadh, which was set up by Saudi Arabia and the US in May 2017 and includes the other Gulf states.
US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, who is attending the Future Investment Initiative forum in Riyadh this week, said the sanctions “coincide with my trip to the Middle East, where I am meeting with my counterparts across the region to bolster the fight against terrorist financing.”
Mnuchin added: “The TFTC’s coordinated disruption of the financial networks used by the Iranian regime to fund terrorism is a powerful demonstration of Gulf unity.
“This action demonstrates the unified position of the Gulf nations and the United States that Iran will not be allowed to escalate its malign activity in the region.”
Twenty-one of the companies targeted by the new sanctions form a vast network of businesses providing financial support to the Basij Resistance Force, a subordinate group of the Revolutionary Guard, the US Treasury said. The companies were used “to oppress domestic opposition with brutal displays of violence” and supply fighters to regional conflicts in Yemen, Syria and elsewhere.
The Treasury said shell companies and other surreptitious measures were used to mask Basij ownership and control over multibillion-dollar business interests in Iran’s automotive, mining, metals, and banking industries, many of which operate across the Middle East and Europe.
The four individuals targeted with sanctions were affiliated to Hezbollah in Lebanon, and coordinated the group’s operations in Iraq, it said.
Among the banks targeted was Bank Mellat, a privately owned Iranian financial institution with links to Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
Mnuchin said this week that the US would increase economic pressure on Iran over its nuclear program. Sanctions reimposed on Tehran by President Donald Trump after he withdrew the US from the 2015 deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program have dried up Iranian oil revenues and cut Iranian banks’ ties to the financial world.
