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Senate Eyes New Banking Sanctions Should Nuclear Agreement with Iran Collapse
By Colby Adams
printUPDATE: Adds details of a White House response in the third paragraph. A bipartisan bill filed Thursday in the U.S. Senate would impose new trade and banking restrictions on Iran if it fails to meet the terms of last month's multinational nuclear agreement. The Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act, introduced by longtime sanctions advocates Mark Kirk (R-IL) and Robert Menendez (D-NJ), would expand U.S. bans on payments to Iran's shipbuilding industry to the country's construction, engineering and mining sectors, and tighten restrictions on payments linked to Iranian oil exports, which account for 80 percent of the country's total revenue. A...
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In response to White House overtures, Senate Democrats agreed Tuesday to hold off consideration of an Iran sanctions bill until after a March deadline to reach a deal on the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.
U.S. lawmakers may soon have enough support to pass a veto-proof measure that would clear the way for sanctions against foreign banks that deal with blacklisted Iranian entities in foreign currencies.
American elections, EU court decisions and a potential wind-down of negotiations with Iran are complicating efforts by the United States and Europe to maintain uniformity in sanctions enforcement, say analysts.
Foreign banks and companies will only reenter the Iranian market upon the finalization of a comprehensive, permanent nuclear agreement with the country, U.S. officials said Tuesday.
Governmental documents published Monday cleared the way for foreign financial institutions to process limited transactions for Iranians but U.S. banks will be unlikely to relax their sanctions policies, according to experts.
As early as Monday, banks will be able to do what has become seemingly unthinkable in the sanctions compliance field during recent years: ramp up their ties to Iran.
The chairman of a Senate committee vowed Thursday to block additional sanctions against Iran in an effort to protect last month's multilateral accord to suspend portions of the country's nuclear program.
Western financial institutions won't radically amend their sanctions controls in response to an agreement to limit Iran's nuclear program in exchange for a relaxation of banking restrictions, say former officials.
Lawmakers should press ahead with Iran sanctions bills despite pressure to put off new restrictions while American and Iranian officials hold nuclear talks, according to David Ibsen, executive director of United Against Nuclear Iran.