The U.S. federal government sanctioned eight Canadian money services businesses on Friday that it said help the Islamic Republic move assets in and out of Iran.
“These companies facilitate the exchange of Iranian rials and other currencies for digital assets to enable international transactions involving Iran,” the U.S. Treasury Department stated.
“Many of these businesses have facilitated transactions with sanctioned Iranian digital asset exchanges, as well as with digital asset addresses associated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” the department said.
Friday’s move was coordinated with the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
Some of those, whom Washington sanctioned on Friday, have worked with Ryan Wedding, a former Olympian and a Canadian drug trafficker, whom the United States has sanctioned and who was arrested in January.
“Canada cannot be a safe haven for illicit financial facilitators that provide sanctions evasion services to the Iranian regime and its proxies,” stated Scott Bessent, the U.S. treasury secretary.
The newly-sanctioned businesses, including Diverse Trade, 1380079 BC, Top PC Technician, NIA Nations Currency, 2397639 Ontario, CCC, B Galaxy and Darvish Exchange, are based in Ontario and British Columbia.
The Treasury Department said that the companies provided the Iranian regime with “financial lifelines.”
The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, the advocacy arm of the Jewish Federations of Canada-UIA, said on Friday that it “has long called on the Canadian government to ensure that Canada is not used as a safe haven for the IRGC, its operatives or other elements of the regime.”
It said that the issue is not just about illicit financial activity.
“It is about individuals and networks operating in Canada to support a despotic regime that murders tens of thousands of its own people, exports terrorism around the world, launches missiles and drones at its neighbors and arms Russia with weapons used in its horrific war against Ukrainians,” CIJA stated.
The advocacy group said that it is urging the Canadian government to “take decisive action against Iran, its proxies and their networks operating in Canada” as it advances its new national security strategy.
The Treasury Department stated that “although Canadian and international media sources have highlighted the sanctions evasion and terrorist financing-related risks that certain of these money services businesses pose, the entities designated today remain operational.”
“Several of these entities have changed their business names and addresses in an attempt to evade detection and enforcement actions,” it said.
