U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken referred during an Aug. 15 press conference to “continued implementation of sanctions against Iran.” That might be news to Tehran, which is seeing an oil production “surge,” now above 2 million barrels daily, Bloomberg reported.
“When the Biden administration tells you that they’re enforcing sanctions, please laugh and ask them about the booming Iranian oil flow over 2 million barrels per day worth around $60 billion annually to the regime,” wrote Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “None of this is restricted to humanitarian use.”
Omri Ceren, national security adviser to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), wrote, “Periodic reminder the Biden admin allowed Iran to rebuild their economy through functionally unlimited sanctions-busting and become a nuclear threshold state. In the last few weeks they sent Iran a $16 billion ransom.”
The Bloomberg article cited the oil shipments monitor TankerTrackers.com, which has observed a notable recent increase in Iranian oil production. Many of the sales are to China, which does not adhere to the sanctions.