The US on Monday imposed new sanctions on 30 people and ships over their alleged role in shipping Iranian oil as the Trump administration is attempting to ramp up its so-called “maximum pressure campaign” against Iran.
According to the Treasury Department, among the sanctioned are oil brokers in the UAE and Hong Kong, tanker operators and managers in India and China, the head of Iran’s National Iranian Oil Company, and the Iranian Oil Terminals Company.
“The United States will use all our available tools to target all aspects of Iran’s oil supply chain, and anyone who deals in Iranian oil exposes themselves to significant sanctions risk,” said US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
The purpose of one of Trump’s orders related to Iran is to “drive Iran’s export of oil to zero.” But Iran has found oil markets in Asia in recent years that aren’t afraid of being targeted by US sanctions, and it’s unclear if the new measures will have much of an impact.
When Trump signed his maximum pressure executive order, he claimed he was “not happy” about doing so and insisted he wanted a deal with Iran over its nuclear program even though he also acknowledged Iranian leadership doesn’t want a nuclear bomb. However, the new sanctions have made diplomacy with Tehran less likely, based on public comments from Iranian officials.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who campaigned on engaging in negotiations with the West to get sanctions relief, has said the new sanctions show the US is not “sincere” about diplomacy.
After Pezeshkian was sworn in last year, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei opened the door to the possibility of talks with the US, saying there was “no harm” in engaging with the “enemy.”
But earlier this month, Khamenei said that talks with the US would not be “wise.” He cited the negotiations to reach the 2015 nuclear deal and the fact that the US under the first Trump administration tore up the deal only a few years later.
President Trump and other US officials have hinted military action is on the table if a deal is not reached with Iran, and recent reports have said Israel is looking to attack Iran in the coming months. “I would like a deal done with Iran on non-nuclear. I would prefer that to bombing the hell out of it. They don’t want to die. Nobody wants to die,” Trump said earlier this month. “If we made the deal, Israel wouldn’t bomb them.”
