US targets Iran’s prosecutor basic, navy officers with new sanctions

The Biden administration on Wednesday unveiled new sanctions on Iranian officers, together with the senior official overseeing the prosecution of protesters, because the nationwide anti-government demonstrations in Iran proceed into their fourth month. 

The US Treasury Division designated Iran’s prosecutor basic, Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, who in late September reportedly directed Iran’s courts to problem harsh sentences to these arrested throughout the protests. 

In keeping with the division, Montazeri “oversees prosecutions and the enforcement of prison judgments all through Iran, together with such actions introduced in Iran’s Revolutionary Courts, the first venue for charging these arrested within the protests.” 

Iran has begun finishing up the loss of life sentence for prisoners jailed amid the unrest. Iranian authorities have publicly executed two prisoners arrested in reference to the protests and sentenced a minimum of a dozen extra to loss of life, in response to activists. 
 
Additionally designated by the Treasury Division was Iranian firm Imen Sanat Zaman Fara, which the Treasury accused of producing and offering Iran’s Legislation Enforcement Forces with armored automobiles utilized in crowd suppression. The corporate additionally produces computerized grenade launchers, bulletproof vests, shields and different merchandise utilized by Iranian safety forces to suppress the protests, the division stated. 

The newest tranche of sanctions additionally focused Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders within the capital metropolis of Tehran and Kurdistan in northwestern Iran for his or her roles within the crackdown. Two senior officers of Iran’s Basij militia forces had been hit with sanctions, one in every of whom oversees efforts to censor Iranians’ on-line actions, the division stated. 

“We denounce the Iranian regime’s intensifying use of violence against its own people who’re advocating for his or her human rights,” Brian Nelson, Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and monetary intelligence, stated in a press release.

“America and our companions are devoted to holding Iranian officials to account for egregious abuses dedicated in opposition to Iranian residents combating for his or her basic freedoms,” Nelson stated.  

Because the protests erupted over the Sept. 16 loss of life in police custody of 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish girl Mahsa Amini, the administration has issued a number of rounds of sanctions focusing on Iranian officers concerned within the violence in opposition to protesters and web censorship.  

On Dec. 9, the Treasury Division designated three Iranian officers, together with the Legislation Enforcement Forces commander in Iran’s western Kermanshah province.