The United States announced new sanctions on Thursday aimed at crippling Iran’s global oil smuggling network, as part of Washington’s continued effort to restrict Tehran’s access to petroleum revenue used for its military and nuclear programs.
The Department of the Treasury said it is blacklisting 29 vessels and their management companies for “facilitating the transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of Iranian petroleum products.”
These vessels are part of what American officials describe as the Islamic Republic’s “shadow fleet,” responsible for disguising shipments through deceptive practices such as false flags, falsified shipping papers, and repeated vessel renaming.
“The United States will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon,” said John Hurley, Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence. “Treasury will continue to deprive the regime of the petroleum revenue it uses to fund its military and weapons programs.”
Among those targeted in the new sanctions is Egyptian businessman Hatem Elsaid Farid Ibrahim Sakr, identified by the Treasury Department as being linked to nearly a quarter of the sanctioned vessels.
The US government also stated that companies operating out of the United Arab Emirates, Panama, the Marshall Islands, India, the British Virgin Islands, and Liberia are also being sanctioned for managing and operating some of the designated ships.
Thursday’s move expands the measures taken throughout the year under the White House’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran.
Since January, the Trump administration has sanctioned more than 180 vessels tied to Iranian petroleum shipping, tightening restrictions on what officials describe as a long-running effort by Tehran to evade international sanctions.