The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Monday on a dozen individuals and entities accused of helping the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps sell and ship Iranian oil to China, as the fragile ceasefire with Tehran appeared increasingly strained.
The announcement came a day before Trump’s scheduled departure for Beijing, where he is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping later this week.
Before a meeting with his national security team on Monday, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that “the ceasefire with Iran is on massive life support” following Iran’s “inappropriate” response to the U.S. draft proposal for ending the war.
“The IRGC relies on front companies in permissive economic jurisdictions to obfuscate its role in oil sales and funnel the revenue to the Iranian regime,” the U.S. Department of the Treasury stated. “Instead of using this revenue to support the struggling Iranian people, the regime directs it toward weapons development, backing terrorist proxies, and funding security forces that suppress citizens’ freedoms.”
The sanctions target three Iranian nationals, including the head, finance chief and commercial chief of the IRGC’s oil headquarters. Treasury also sanctioned four Hong Kong-based shell companies, four companies in the United Arab Emirates and one in Oman.
The Trump administration has repeatedly targeted Iranian and allied entities during the war under “Economic Fury,” the sanctions campaign accompanying “Operation Epic Fury.”
“As Iran’s military desperately tries to regroup, Economic Fury will continue to deprive the regime of funding for its weapons programs, terrorist proxies and nuclear ambitions,” Scott Bessent, the U.S. treasury secretary, stated. “Treasury will continue to cut the Iranian regime off from the financial networks it uses to carry out terrorist acts and to destabilize the global economy.”
According to the department, Economic Fury “has disrupted billions in projected oil revenue, taken actions that have led to the freezing of nearly half a billion dollars in regime-linked cryptocurrency, and cracked down on Tehran’s shadow banking networks.”
