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House Terror Finance Task Force Hears of Tough Road with Iran

By Colby Adams

Western officials face an uphill battle in preventing Iran from exploiting the global financial system once key banking restrictions against the Persian nation are lifted, U.S. lawmakers and witnesses said Wednesday. In a hearing, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) said that the readmission of the Central Bank of Iran and several other Iranian banks into the Brussels-based Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift), as mandated by this month's permanent nuclear accord, eases the Islamic republic's ability to finance Hezbollah and other blacklisted groups. In the three years since Swift barred a majority of Iranian banks from...

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