BICOM

The United States, United Kingdom and Canada are set to announce a new round of sanctions against Iran today, US officials told ABC News. The new sanctions will target Iran’s financial system, not including Iran’s central bank, as well as its petrochemicals sector.

The two US officials, speaking anonymously, told ABC yesterday that the State Department will target both foreign and Iranian companies that have been making the most of opportunities in Iran’s petrochemical sector as foreign companies pull out in fear of sanctions. The two officials also said that the US Treasury is expected to label Iran’s financial system a ‘jurisdiction of primary money laundering concern.’ Such a move would require US banks to prove that their foreign accounts do not deal with Iran, further discouraging banks from doing business with Teheran.

Concurrently, the UK and Canada will announce sanctions curbing Iran’s access to British and Canadian economies and markets, according to the ABC report.

In related news, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) issued a resolution on Friday expressing its ‘deep and increasing concern’ at the ‘unresolved issues regarding the Iranian nuclear program,’ including the ‘existence of possible military dimensions.’  The resolution was adopted with 32 votes in favour and two (Cuba and Ecuador) against.  It followed the issuing of the IAEA’s report last week, which increased tensions in the Middle East and led to redoubled calls in Western capitals for stiffer sanctions against Iran.

The IAEA resolution failed, however, to indicate any concrete punitive steps to be taken in the event that Iran continues with its attempts to achieve nuclear weapons capability. Iran itself, meanwhile, dismissed the resolution. Iranian ambassador to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, said that the recent IAEA report was ‘unprofessional, unbalanced, illegal and politicised,’ and hence any resolution based on it was not ‘legally binding.’