Trump tightens financial noose around Iran’s mullahs

Ali Rajab

The noose of US sanctions is tightening even more around Iran’s mullahs, especially after Washington imposed a new regime of sanctions on the Central Bank of Iran and the Islamic Republic’s sovereign fund.

By imposing sanctions on both entities, the administration of US President Donald Trump wants to put an end to Iran’s financing of terrorist activities.

Trump imposed the new sanctions on September 20, accusing the two bodies of offering financing to terrorism. He described the new sanctions as the toughest on Iran.

Iran’s financial institutions have been at the center of US sanctions since November 2018, especially after the US pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.

According to Bloomberg, US Secretary of the treasury, Steven Mnuchin, said the sanctions imposed on the Central Bank of Iran and the country’s sovereign fund would reduce financing to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corpse.

The same sanctions may also make the Iranian government less capable of making basic commodities available for ordinary Iranians. They will make the government less capable of carrying financial transactions in cooperation with other governments or honor its obligations to international companies.

The governor of the Iranian Central Bank said the US had imposed sanctions on the bank once more, having failed in finding another method to put pressure on Iran.

On September 21, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif denounced the new sanctions.

They are, he said, a new attempt by the US to deprive ordinary Iranians of food and medicines.

Zarif noted that the move also reflects growing desperation inside the US.

In an attempt to get around the sanctions, the Iranian Central Bank announced on September 17 that it would network with the Central Bank of Russia, away from the international financial system.

These attempts came as Iran teetered on the edge of an economic crisis. The World Bank had a poor assessment of the Iranian economy.

In mid-2018, the bank expected the Iranian economy to grow by 4.1% in 2019. However, it said later that the economy would grow by 3.6% at most. It then said the economy would grow by 3.5%.