The US on Thursday imposed sanctions on top Iranian officials, including the interior and communications ministers.
The move comes days after US President Joe Biden said Washington would increase costs on Iranian officials tied to violence against protesters.
Brian Nelson, the under secretary of the Treasury, said Washington is determined to punish those who are behind the crackdown on protests, now approaching their fourth week, over the death of Mahsa Amini in morality police custody.
“The United States condemns the Iranian government’s internet shutdown and continued violent suppression of peaceful protest and will not hesitate to target those who direct and support such actions,” Mr Nelson said.
The sanctions were announced by the US Treasury on its website and hit seven senior leaders within Iran’s government and security apparatus. These include Iran’s Minister of the Interior Ahmad Vahidi and Minister of Communications Eisa Zarepour.
Sanctions were also slapped on five senior security officials, including Yadollah Javani, deputy political commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC); Vahid Mohammad Naser Majid, head of the Iranian Cyber Police; and Hossein Nejat, an IRGC commander and close associate of Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei.
They also hit top leaders of the Law Enforcement Forces (LEF), including Hossein Sajedinia, deputy operations commander, and Hossein Rahimi, the LEF police chief in Tehran.
Henry Rome, an Iran watcher and a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Middle East Policy, said the impact of the sanctions is more political than it is material.
“The designations probably would not materially affect the calculus of those perpetrating the crackdown,” Mr Rome told The National.
But he said that they serve the important purpose of showing international support for the protesters.
“They are a way for the US to disseminate credible information about the scope and scale of repression in Iran, they are a sign of support for the peaceful protesters and they lay the groundwork for other countries to adopt similar sanctions regimes in an effort to build international cohesion.”
Human rights organisations have reported that hundreds may have been killed in the protests.
On Thursday, Amnesty International accused Iranian security forces of killing at least 66 people, including children, and injuring “hundreds of others after firing live ammunition, metal pellets and teargas at protesters, bystanders and worshippers during a violent crackdown” after Friday prayers in Zahedan as well as Sistan and Baluchestan provinces.
Iranian riot police clash with university students — video
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Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
