U.S. officials should blacklist an elite Iranian military branch and its foreign proxies for their suspected financial support of terrorism, analysts and lawmakers said Thursday. In a hearing, House Foreign Affairs Committee members said that the Iran Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah stand to gain the most from the guaranteed repatriation of an estimated $100 billion of oil profits under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a six-nation accord finalized in July. The agreement could see the lifting of broad prohibitions against sectors of the Iranian economy and the revocation of sanctions targeting businesses controlled...
The nuclear accord reached last year between five Western nations and Iran has done more than stir hopes and fears about the Islamic republic's return to global markets. For U.S. sanctions experts, the deal has also created a mountain of work, according to a former Treasury Department official.
The expected reemergence of Iran on global markets will likely pose the toughest challenge for sanctions compliance officers in the coming year, according to Alexandre Lamy, an attorney with Baker & McKenzie's International Trade Practice Group.
Should Iranian companies rejoin global markets next year under the terms of last month's intergovernmental accord, sanctioned Russian businesses could be discreetly riding on their coattails.
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