US slaps sanctions on Central Bank of Iran subsidiary, entities based in UAE, Turkey

The United States says it has imposed sanctions on a subsidiary of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI), along with two entities based in the United Arab Emirates, one in Turkey and on three individuals for smuggling US technology to the CBI.

“These designations target three individuals and four entities tied to the procurement of sophisticated US technology for use by CBI in violation of US export restrictions and sanctions,” the Treasury Department says.

In a statement, the Treasury notes the CBI is itself already under sanction for providing financial support to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’s Quds Force (IRGC-QF), an elite arm that carries out overseas operations, and to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah terror group in Lebanon.

The sanctions represent Washington’s latest efforts to punish Tehran, whose proxies in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and the Gaza Strip have attacked US and Israeli targets.

The Treasury named the entities as Iran-based Informatics Services Corporation (ISC), a subsidiary of CBI; UAE-based Advance Banking Solution Trading DMCC (ABS), an ISC front company; UAE-based Freedom Star General Trading Co. (LLC); and Turkey-based Ted Teknoloji Gelistirme Hizmetleri Sanayi Ticaret Anonim Sirketi (Ted).

It identified the three individuals as ISC Chief Executive Seyed Abotaleb Najafi, Freedom Star President Mohammad Reza Khademi, and ISC employee Pouria Mirdamadi, a dual French and Iranian national it said was involved in Ted’s operations.