The federal government sanctioned three Iranian intelligence officials—Gholamhossein Mohammadnia, Reza Amiri Moghadam and Taqi Daneshvar—for being “involved in the abduction, detention and probable death of former FBI special agent Robert A. ‘Bob’ Levinson,” the U.S. Treasury Department stated on Tuesday.
“Iran’s treatment of Mr. Levinson remains a blight on Iran’s already grim record of human rights abuse,” stated Scott Bessent, the U.S. treasury secretary.
The Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security “has a history of wrongfully detaining U.S. nationals and has been designated across various sanctions programs,” stated Tammy Bruce, spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department.
In December 2020, the federal government designated Mohammad Baseri and Ahmad Khazai, “who acted in their capacity as MOIS officers in Mr. Levinson’s abduction, detention and probable death,” Bruce noted.
She added that the State Department’s Rewards for Justice program has offered up to $20 million since November 2019 for information that leads to the “location, recovery and return of Bob Levinson and the identification of those responsible for his disappearance.”
A Jewish special agent who retired in 1998, Levinson “went missing during a business trip to Kish Island, Iran, on March 9, 2007,” according to the FBI website.
One of the sanctioned Iranians is the Islamic Republic’s ambassador to Pakistan, and another was the Iranian ambassador to Albania in 2016 before being expelled from Albania in December 2018 for “damaging its national security,” the Treasury Department stated.
