US imposes new sanctions targeting Iranian officials behind deadly protest crackdowns

WASHINGTON (TNND) — The U.S. is imposing a new round of sanctions on Thursday “against the architects of the Iranian regime’s brutal crackdown on peaceful demonstrators,” according to the Treasury Department.

The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) also said it was designating 18 people and companies that have participated in laundering money from sales of Iranian petroleum and petrochemicals to foreign markets as part of a “shadow banking” network of sanctioned Iranian financial institutions Bank Melli and Shahr Bank.

Shadow banking refers to financial activities and institutions that act like banks but operate outside the regulations of the traditional banking system.

“Rather than using these revenues to benefit the Iranian people, who face economic calamity amid crippling inflation and massive deficits caused by the regime’s economic mismanagement, these funds are instead used to finance the regime’s repression of the Iranian people and its support for terrorist groups abroad,” a release read.

Ali Larijani, the Secretary of the Supreme Council for National Security, is among the Iranian security officials being sanctioned. The U.S. accuses him of being one of the first officials to call for violence against Iranian protesters.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the U.S. “stands firmly behind the Iranian people in their call for freedom and justice,” adding that the Treasury “will use every tool to target those behind the regime’s tyrannical oppression of human rights.”

Protests in Iran began on Dec. 28 amid a crumbling currency and deeply troubled economy.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that a “credible source” told him killings tied to Iran’s ongoing crackdown on protesters have stopped.

“We’ll find out,” the president said in the Oval Office, adding that time would tell whether Iran’s actions match its words.

Iran’s crackdown on the demonstrations has killed at least 2,615, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported.

In February, President Donald Trump reimposed a “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran in an effort to block its development of nuclear weapons. The campaign included U.S.-led strikes on three critical Iranian enrichment facilities.

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Editor’s note: The Associated Press contributed to this article.