The United States announced sanctions on a Turkish bank as well as two other entities, as part of its latest economic squeeze on Iran under ‘Operation Economic Outcast’.
Following the sanctions, the department said that all property and interests in property of the designated or blocked persons which are in possession or control of US persons would be blocked and must be reported to the OFAC. The treasury department alleged that the Golden Global Bank had facilitated tens of millions of dollars’ worth of transactions for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF). Trump has, in the past few days, attempted to use economic pressure as a major weapon against Iran. Washington wants to cut Iran off from money and make it harder for the government to fund itself. The success of the plan will depend heavily on whether other countries follow the US sanctions.
The sanctions, announced on the website of the US treasury department, were imposed on the Golden Global Investment Bank, a small firm which has a capital of about $34 million. The sanctions were announced on August 24 in an effort to seemingly cut off Iran’s lifelines.
In a statement on Friday, the US department of treasury said it had “severed the Iranian regime’s critical financial lifelines” in Turkey. It further said that the it had also provided Iran with the “key correspondent banking access that allows it to move its funds internationally. The measures target networks involved in buying weapons, gathering intelligence, hacking US infrastructure and moving Iranian oil to generate revenue for Iran’s regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF), US state department spokesperson Tommy Pigott has said.
