The U.S. imposed sanctions on an Iranian petroleum shipping network with links to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force, or IRGC-QF, and offered a reward of up to $15 million in exchange of information that could disrupt the organization's financial operations.
The Department of Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control designated 16 entities and 10 individuals to its sanctions list, and identified 11 vessels as blocked properties.
It claims that the network "enables the IRGC-QF to obfuscate its involvement in selling Iranian oil" and is involved in moving hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of crude to the Syrian regime.
"This vast oil-for-terror shipping network demonstrates how economically reliant Tehran is on the IRGC-QF and Hizballah as financial lifelines," it said in a statement. The U.S. also warned that entities who intend to facilitate the IRGC-QF's oil sales will face "swift consequences."
Meanwhile, Washington announced a reward of up to $15 million for information that could lead "to the disruption of the financial mechanisms of the IRGC," the Department of State said in a statement.
The new sanctions come amid efforts to bring Tehran back to the negotiating table over the 2015 Iranian nuclear accord, from which the Trump administration pulled out in 2018.
