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MEOG PoLICy MEOG
Latest US moves Iran include sanctions on petchem traders
Iran
ThE Trump administration has closed a loop- hole that has allowed Iranians to apply for trade and investment visas to gain entry to the US despite Iran being the main target of its travel ban — referred to as the “Muslim ban” by detrac- tors — according to information posted on the US Visa and Immigration website last week.
The US Department of homeland Security said Iranians and their families were no longer eligible to apply for or extend non-immigrant E-1 and E-2 visas based on a treaty of amity signed with Iran before its 1979 Islamic Revo- lution. It added that the treaty had been termi- nated. Iranians currently holding and properly maintaining E-1 or E-2 status are permitted to remain in the US until their current status expires, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services added.
The number of Iranians on such visas, who were permitted entry to the US to engage in international trade or to invest a large sum of capital, is not known. As it required significant amounts of money to apply through the E-1 or E-2 route, the best estimate is that around 48,000 Iranians applied.
Separately, in another move in its “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran to try to force changes in the country’s role in Middle East affairs, the US Treasury and State departments have announced new sanctions on petrochem- ical and petroleum companies in hong Kong, Dubai and Shanghai for facilitating hundreds of millions of dollars in crude oil, petrochemical and refined product exports from the National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC).
According to Treasury officials, one firm, Tri- liance Petrochemical, a hong Kong-based bro- ker, ordered the transfer of millions of dollars in payments to NIOC for Iranian petrochemical, crude, and petroleum products shipped to the
UAE and China in 2019.
however, Platts reported on January 24
that analysts did not believe the new sanctions aimed at shutting down illicit petroleum and petrochemical trade between Iran and China would substantially affect China’s status as the top importer of Iranian crude, with more than 200,000 bpd of illicit flows anticipated to continue.
“With these new sanctions, the US is essen- tially mowing the lawn on illicit Chinese trade,” henry Rome, an Iran analyst with Eurasia Group, was cited as saying. “US sanctions have thus far not deterred much of it; hence the need for frequent rounds of new action.”
In recent months, a large share of Iranian oil flowing to China has been going through the UAE and Malaysia, both of which are popular hubs for ship-to-ship transfers, according to sources quoted by Platts. Richard Nephew, the principal deputy co-ordinator for sanctions pol- icy at the State Department during the Obama administration, was quoted as saying that the fresh sanctions would do little to disrupt trade. “I see this as a one-off and trade will continue. This is one network. There are and will be others.”
A key objective of the US sanctions-led cam- paign against Iran is introducing even tighter restrictions on the country’s nuclear develop- ment programme than were agreed under the 2015 nuclear deal.
however, on January 25, Iran’s nuclear agency said that if the Iranian authorities make the request, it has the capacity to enrich uranium at any percentage.
“At the moment, if [the Iranian authorities] make the decision, the Atomic Energy Organ- isation, as the executor, will be able to enrich uranium at any percentage,” deputy head of the agency Ali Asghar Zarean said.™
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