Wall Street Journal:
U.S. Sanctions on Iran Target Humanitarian Supplies
WASHINGTON (Dispatches) – New U.S. sanctions announced on Tuesday may target humanitarian supplies because of its targeting of a bank, the Wall Street Journal quoted lawyers and analysts as saying Friday.
They also could signal a harder-line approach toward Iran as the U.S. prepares to restore the final tranche of its sanctions lifted following the 2015 nuclear accord that target key economic engines, such as oil and petrochemicals, it said. President Donald Trump said in May when exiting the nuclear deal that the sanctions would phase back in over a 180-day period.
The measures announced this week by the U.S. Treasury Department target more than 20 companies and financial institutions.
The restrictions also were meant to send a warning to companies and governments considering continued dealings with Iran after the restoration of sanctions, senior administration officials told reporters.
The Journal cited Iran’s Parsian Bank, one of the institutions blacklisted this week, saying it is seen as a key conduit for international humanitarian trade with Iran.
Observers suggested the sanctions could chill funding for otherwise legal exports to Iran, such as medicine and food, the paper said.
"This will make it more difficult to get financing for humanitarian projects,” said Adam M. Smith, a partner at law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, who previously served as a senior adviser to the director of the Treasury Department’s sanctions office. "That makes me very nervous.”
The sanctions freeze U.S. assets and bar Americans from conducting transactions with those targeted.
During the era of heightened sanctions on Iran, Parsian covered "a substantial volume of the humanitarian trade” in goods and services, and imports of food and medicine, the bank says on its website.
Parsian also says it has an established an anti-money-laundering compliance program and that it follows national and international standards. The company has held compliance training for its staff, as well as for other Iranian lenders, "in an effort to promote the proficiency of the personnel within the Iranian banking system,” Alireza Alaei, the bank’s manager of its international operations, is quoted as saying on the bank’s website.
The sanctions this week come ahead of the restoration of restrictions on the Iranian shipping sector, the oil sector and the central bank, scheduled for Nov. 4.
Muhammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, condemned this week’s sanctions on Twitter , saying they violate an international court order not to impede humanitarian trade.
"Utter disregard for rule of law & human rights of an entire people,” he said, calling the U.S. an "outlaw regime” with an "addiction to sanctions.”
One of the likely intended audiences for the sanctions on Parsian Bank was the European signatories to the nuclear deal, according to a note issued by the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy firm. The European Union considers Iran’s access to humanitarian goods a priority, and European officials likely are outraged by the step against the bank, the note said.
They also could signal a harder-line approach toward Iran as the U.S. prepares to restore the final tranche of its sanctions lifted following the 2015 nuclear accord that target key economic engines, such as oil and petrochemicals, it said. President Donald Trump said in May when exiting the nuclear deal that the sanctions would phase back in over a 180-day period.
The measures announced this week by the U.S. Treasury Department target more than 20 companies and financial institutions.
The restrictions also were meant to send a warning to companies and governments considering continued dealings with Iran after the restoration of sanctions, senior administration officials told reporters.
The Journal cited Iran’s Parsian Bank, one of the institutions blacklisted this week, saying it is seen as a key conduit for international humanitarian trade with Iran.
Observers suggested the sanctions could chill funding for otherwise legal exports to Iran, such as medicine and food, the paper said.
"This will make it more difficult to get financing for humanitarian projects,” said Adam M. Smith, a partner at law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, who previously served as a senior adviser to the director of the Treasury Department’s sanctions office. "That makes me very nervous.”
The sanctions freeze U.S. assets and bar Americans from conducting transactions with those targeted.
During the era of heightened sanctions on Iran, Parsian covered "a substantial volume of the humanitarian trade” in goods and services, and imports of food and medicine, the bank says on its website.
Parsian also says it has an established an anti-money-laundering compliance program and that it follows national and international standards. The company has held compliance training for its staff, as well as for other Iranian lenders, "in an effort to promote the proficiency of the personnel within the Iranian banking system,” Alireza Alaei, the bank’s manager of its international operations, is quoted as saying on the bank’s website.
The sanctions this week come ahead of the restoration of restrictions on the Iranian shipping sector, the oil sector and the central bank, scheduled for Nov. 4.
Muhammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, condemned this week’s sanctions on Twitter , saying they violate an international court order not to impede humanitarian trade.
"Utter disregard for rule of law & human rights of an entire people,” he said, calling the U.S. an "outlaw regime” with an "addiction to sanctions.”
One of the likely intended audiences for the sanctions on Parsian Bank was the European signatories to the nuclear deal, according to a note issued by the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy firm. The European Union considers Iran’s access to humanitarian goods a priority, and European officials likely are outraged by the step against the bank, the note said.