(CN) — Amid escalating tensions in the Middle East, the Trump administration announced Friday that it would sanction a number of top Iranian officials as well as leading steel and iron producers in the region.
“The president is issuing an executive order authorizing the imposition of additional sanctions against any individual owning, operating, trading with, or assisting sectors of the Iranian economy,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said this morning at a White House briefing.
Mnuchin said the eight officials facing sanctions had advanced the regime’s destabilizing activity and were involved in the ballistic missile strikes Tuesday at Iraqi military bases housing U.S. troops. The list includes Iran secretary of Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani, Iranian armed forces deputy chief of staff Gholamreza Soleimani and regime-supporting Basij militia leader Mohammad Reza Ashtiani.
The Treasury also sanctioned 17 high-earning Iranian metal manufacturers in an effort to diminish the region’s revenue streams.
“As a result of these actions, we will cut off billions of dollars of support to the Iranian regime," Mnuchin said.
The sanctions, Mnuchin continued, will cease only when the regime “commits to never having nuclear weapons” and “stops the funding of global terrorism.”
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the action will strike at the heart of the Islamic Republic’s inner security apparatus.
“We want Iran to behave like a normal nation,” he told reporters Friday. “We believe the sanctions that we proposed today further that strategic objective.”
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