The US Treasury Department announced new sanctions on Friday targeting Iran's "shadow fleet," adding eight Iranian shipping and oil companies to the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list, amid rising tensions and the regime's violent suppression of protests.
According to the Treasury, the sanctions apply to nine vessels and eight companies involved in smuggling Iranian oil worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Washington says the proceeds from these activities are used to fund terrorist organizations, weapons programs and the repression of demonstrators inside Iran.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Iranian regime was "engaged in economic self-destruction," a process he said had been accelerated by President Donald Trump's maximum pressure policy. "Tehran's decision to support terrorists instead of its own people has caused Iran's currency and standard of living to collapse," Bessent said. He added that the Treasury would "continue to track the tens of millions of dollars the regime has stolen and is desperately trying to funnel into banks outside Iran."
Among the sanctioned vessels are ships registered in Palau, Comoros and Panama that transported hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude oil, liquefied petroleum gas and other products to countries in East Asia, as well as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Somalia and Djibouti. The companies designated by the Treasury operate out of the United Arab Emirates, India, Oman, the Seychelles, the Marshall Islands and Liberia, and were allegedly established specifically to operate the vessels and facilitate oil smuggling.
In a related development, US Gen. Brad Cooper, commander of US Central Command, is due to arrive in Israel on Saturday. During his visit, Cooper is expected to meet with IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir and Israeli Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Tomer Bar.
The latest sanctions come against the backdrop of a wave of protests that erupted in Iran in late December and were met with a violent crackdown by the authorities. The Iranian Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported on Thursday that the number of confirmed fatalities had reached 5,002, with an additional 9,800 deaths still under investigation. According to the group, more than 26,000 people have been arrested since the protests began, and 7,400 were seriously injured. Iranian authorities, for their part, claim the death toll stands at 3,117.
Alongside the violent repression, the Iranian regime has imposed an almost total internet shutdown, now in its third week. The blackout, which began on Jan. 8, has severely hampered efforts to document events and transmit information from inside the country. Iranian officials said there was no timetable for lifting the restrictions and that restoring access would be carried out "gradually, locally and in a controlled manner."
On the international stage, the European Parliament has called for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to be designated a terrorist organization. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that if the Iranian regime manages to survive by killing its own citizens, "it will be a failure of the international community."
