Iran denounces latest US sanctions as 'fruitless'

Tehran says ‘enforcers’ bound to realize ‘the futility of their schemes,’ as Washington unrolls further measures against Islamic Republic

Iran’s foreign ministry denounced the latest US Treasury sanctions as “fruitless and senseless” in a statement issued on Wednesday.

“These fruitless, senseless and ineffective sanctions… will undoubtedly never achieve the desired outcome of their designers and enforcers,” it said.

“Sooner or later they will become aware of the futility of their schemes.”

Washington slapped fresh sanctions on Tehran Tuesday, accusing it of creating a complex web of Russian cut-out companies and Syrian intermediaries to ship oil to Damascus, which in turn bankrolled Hezbollah and Hamas.

The US considers the heavily armed Lebanese Hezbollah and Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip, to both be terrorist organizations.

The US Treasury said in a statement that Tehran, “working with Russian companies, provides millions of barrels of oil to the Syrian government” of President Bashar Assad.

“The Assad regime, in turn, facilitates the movement of hundreds of millions of US dollars to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps – Qods Force for onward transfer to Hamas and Hezbollah,” it said, referring to Iran’s main foreign military operations unit.

The US hopes the strict sanctions, which are designed to cripple Iran’s oil sales as well as limit its international trade activities, will force Tehran to renegotiate a 2015 nuclear agreement that the Trump administration pulled out of in May, saying it falls short of preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. The US also wants to impose limitations on Iran’s missile development program, in particular its long-range rockets.