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For all the sanctions on Iran, Tehran has secured willing customers for its crucial oil and gas exports in the worlds leading authoritarian and communist regimes: Venezuela and China. Caracas has taken a creative route, first paying gold for oil and then bartering its own heavy crude for Iranian gas condensates. Beijing, by contrast, pays cash straight up $280 billion in 2019, followed by a deal worth $400 billion this year. Naturally, this illicit trade weakens efforts to compel Iran to moderate its destructive behavior and end its pursuit of nuclear weapons, potentially harming U.S. interests and national security.

Yet Irans success in courting Venezuela and China does not mean that U.S. sanctions have failed. Sanctions have forced the regime to trade with a few like-minded authoritarian regimes. And crucially, sanctions have forced Iran to go to extraordinary lengths to conceal its illicit shipping commerce: satellite tracking deceptions, doctoring of records, flag- and name-switching, physical camouflage, and a host of other maritime violations.

With a better understanding of the shipping subterfuge, the U.S. and its allies can make the whole rogue enterprise prohibitively costly for all parties, plugging enforcement gaps and truly squeezing Tehran.

For instance, FELICITY was the first Iranian-flagged vessel to load Venezuelan crude, according to TankerTrackers.com. It reportedly journeyed to Venezuelas Jose Anchorage using subversive and illegal techniques, including a shutdown of its tracking beacon. Before arriving in Venezuela, FELICITY was last seen via its satellite transponder 13 months prior in Taizhou Anchorage in China, according to Marine Traffic meaning that the vessel sailed all the way to Venezuela with its transponder off. Disabling the transponder is a favored tactic to obscure the movement of goods, but its also a dangerous violation of International Maritime Organization safety rules. FELICITY even turned to more rudimentary methods to hide its activities undergoing a fresh paint job in Venezuela.

Vessels moving Iranian oil carry falsified records that attest to their cargo originating in countries such as Oman, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Iraq and Malaysia. By engaging in ship-to-ship (STS) transfers of oil from Iranian-flagged vessels to tankers owned by non-Iranian firms, Iran can obscure the origin of the oil and gas, as well as the trade itself for its customers. STS transfers are often preceded by vessels spoofing their location to fake their position, sometimes by thousands of nautical miles, creating yet another dangerous situation.

Smaller and under-resourced nations are routinely duped into the illicit trade by foreign-flagged rogue vessels, such as those included in Irans Ghost Armada, our organization, United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), has found. These national flagging authorities are often unable to adequately patrol the activities of their flag-bearers, and so are targeted in order to fulfill ship registration requirements. Ships that are part of the Ghost Armada repeatedly switch flags, change names and alter their physical markings.

When advocacy groups such as ours notify maritime authorities of illicit activities of registered vessels, we find that most are eager to comply with U.S. sanctions. Some even have come to rely upon nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to serve as their eyes and ears. Through our work, dozens of vessels have been stripped of their flags, making it more difficult to continue their subterfuge.

The whole gamut of shipping deceptions perpetrated by commercial facilitators and their enablers must be made far more costly prohibitively so. As a first step, we recommend the Treasury Department broaden the scope of sanctions-triggering activities that constitute significant support to Irans shipping sector. The U.S. should punish bunkering specialists, port authorities, importing agents, management firms, charterers, operators, marine insurers, classification societies and all other maritime services providers involved with Iran. The Treasury also should expand and delineate the range of sanctionable maritime services and work to identify and target any Venezuelan or Chinese firms complicit in smuggling.

Sanctions have slowed the flow of foreign capital and reduced Irans trading partners to the worst-of-the-worst. But U.S. sanctions are only as robust as the enforcement mechanisms that come with them. Iran and its dubious allies are perpetuating a vicious cycle that undermines global compliance and further allows the Iranian regime to continue its destructive and malign behavior. A sharper focus on the specific methods and their perpetrators is needed to cut off Irans oil spigot.

Daniel Roth is the research director and Claire Jungman is the chief of staff of United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), a nonprofit, nonpartisan policy organization based in New York that was formed in 2008 to combat the threats posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

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Let's plug the sanctions gaps that enable Iran to sell oil to China and Venezuela | TheHill - The Hill

Iran has set a third date for the execution of a man convicted of a murder he committed at the age of 17 after the sentence was twice postponed amid an international outcry.

Arman Abdolali, now 25, is due to be executed on Wednesday after he was convicted of killing his girlfriend, rights group Amnesty International reported.

Iran has signed an international agreement banning the death penalty for people who committed crimes while under the age of 18.

Campaigners say Abdolali was sentenced to death in December 2015 following an unfair trial marred by confessions obtained under torture.

The Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights said Abdolali confessed to the murder at the time of his arrest, but the body was never found and he later withdrew his confession.

The sentence was upheld in 2016 and he lost an appeal last year.

He has been moved to solitary confinement for a third time at Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj, on the outskirts of Tehran, in preparation for his execution, said Amnesty.

Abdolali was due to die last Wednesday and at the weekend but the execution was postponed on both occasions.

Iran executes more people each year than any other nation except China. Iran Human Rights said at least 64 juvenile offenders have been executed in the country over the past 10 years, with at least four executed in 2020.

In a sign of international concern over the case, Germany's human rights commissioner Baerbel Kofler said carrying out the execution would be an unacceptable breach of international law".

Arman Abdolali was a minor at the time of the alleged crime. There is credible evidence that his confession was obtained under torture and that the conviction thus contradicts fundamental principles of the rule of law, she said in a statement released by the German foreign ministry.

The UN has repeatedly condemned Iran for executing child offenders, saying it is a breach of international law.

Iran signed a UN deal banning the practice in 1968 that was ratified seven years later.

Updated: October 19th 2021, 5:16 AM

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Iran sets third execution date in eight days for convicted killer - The National

Iran's Foreign Ministry has said the US is resorting to Hollywood scenarios in order to justify new sanctions against Tehran. Washington blacklisted Iranians accused of planning to kidnap a journalist in New York.

Supporters and merchants of sanctions, who see their sanctions tool box empty due to Iran's maximum resistance, are now resorting to Hollywood scenarios to keep the sanctions alive, Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Saeed Khatibzabeh said in a statement.

Washington must understand that it has no choice but to abandon its addiction to sanctions and respect Iran.

On Friday, the US Treasury Department sanctioned four Iranians, whom a US court indicted in July on charges of plotting the kidnapping of New York-based Iranian-American journalist and activist Masih Alinejad, bank and money fraud, and money laundering.

US officials said the indicted Iranians were intelligence operatives, who hired a private investigator and wanted to transport Alinejad from New York to Venezuela on a military-style speedboat.

Alinejad said at the time that her alleged abduction attempt was orchestrated by Irans former President Hassan Rouhani.

Irans Foreign Ministry spokesperson Khatibzadeh dismissed the allegations as baseless and ridiculous.

US-Iranian relations began deteriorating rapidly after former US President Donald Trump took the country out of the 2015 international deal of the Iranian nuclear program and imposed several rounds of sanctions on Tehran.

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Iran tells US to drop addiction to sanctions after ...

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said on Saturday Iran was ready to hold talks with world powers to revive its 2015 nuclear accord but not under Western "pressure", adding Tehran was seeking negotiations leading to a lifting of U.S. sanctions.

"The Westerners and the Americans are after talks together with pressure ... I have already announced that we will have talks on our government's agenda but not with ... pressure," Raisi said in a live interview with state television.

"Talks are on the agenda ... We are seeking goal-oriented negotiations ... so sanctions on the Iranian people are lifted," Raisi said.

France and Germany have urged Iran to return to negotiations after a break in talks following Iranian elections in June, with Paris demanding an immediate restart amid Western concerns over Tehran's expanding atomic work.

Last month, France, Germany and Britain voiced concern about reports from the UN nuclear watchdog confirming Iran has produced uranium metal enriched up to 20% fissile purity for the first time and lifted production capacity of uranium enriched to 60%.

Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful, that it has informed the watchdog about its activities, and that its moves away from the 2015 deal would be reversed if the United States returned to the accord and lifted sanctions.

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Iran ready for nuclear talks, but not under Western ...

Washington, DC Tehran says it is seeking sanction relief; Washington says containing the Iranian nuclear programme is a national security priority.

And so, both countries maintained that they have an interest in reviving the 2015 nuclear deal. But six rounds of talks in Vienna earlier this year have failed to produce a path to restore the multilateral agreement.

The election of conservative President Ebrahim Raisi in Iran has further complicated the situation. Negotiations have been on ice since June with the Iranian government in transition. Last week, the Iranian parliament approved Raisis cabinet, but the parties are yet to set solid plans for resuming the negotiations.

With hardliners consolidating power in Iran and US President Joe Biden tackling multiple crises at home, analysts have said reviving the nuclear pact will be difficult.

Negar Mortazavi, an Iranian-American journalist and analyst, said she is pessimistic about the prospects of reinstating the deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

A Raisi government run by ideologues and more interested in relations with China and Russia will not be rushing to negotiate with the US, she said.

Im prepared for the possibility that the return would not happen, Mortazavi told Al Jazeera.

And this is not only on the Iranian side, but its also the Biden administration. Joe Biden himself even though he did promise a return to the JCPOA it doesnt seem like hes willing to spend the political capital that is required for this return.

As a candidate, Biden pledged to restore the deal that saw Iran curb its nuclear programme in exchange for lifting sanctions against its economy.

The administration says it seeks to make the deal longer and stronger and use it as a platform to address broader issues with Tehran, including Irans ballistic missiles and regional activities.

On Thursday, Irans foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said Iran agrees in principle to resuming the Vienna talks.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry said Amirabdollahian told his German counterpart, Heiko Maas, that negotiations must result in removing all sanctions on the country and fulfilling the rights of the Iranian people.

Amirabdollahian also made it clear that Tehran is more interested in ties in its immediate neighbourhood rather than repairing relations with the West.

Amirabdollahian blamed regional crises on interventions by foreign powers, saying the current Iranian administration will prioritise good relations with neighbours, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

But can regional ties, including with China and the Arab World, make sanctions relief a less pressing matter for Iran?

The consolidation of power across Iranian system by the conservatives and the hardliners means that you have a significant body of opinion who believes in the notion of a resistance economy, said Naysan Rafati, senior analyst on Iran at the Crisis Group.

Rafati explained that proponents of this idea argue that by relying on its domestic capabilities and regional trade, including exports of oil and gas, where sanctions allow, Iran can create an economy that may not be able to thrive but can survive.

World Bank data shows that Irans GDP is bouncing back into the positive despite sanctions and the coronavirus pandemic after a major dip in 2018 and 2019.

Rafati said the GDP rebound hides a multitude of fault lines in the Iranian economy, including high unemployment rates and rampant inflation, which have spurred up protests during the past year.

But there are individuals in the ascendancy within the Iranian system of government who genuinely believe that sanctions relief is overrated, and that Iran has in their view taken the sanctions hit on the chin and survived and can continue to do so, Rafati told Al Jazeera.

The US has been piling sanctions on Iran since former President Donald Trump nixed the JCPOA in 2018.

In turn, Iran has been escalating its nuclear programme, taking uranium enrichment to 60 percent from the 3.67-percent limit set by the agreement. Tehran has also restricted access to UN nuclear watchdog (IAEA) inspectors to its nuclear facilities.

The Biden administration has been pushing a mutual compliance framework to revive the agreement the US removes sanctions; Iran rolls back its nuclear advances. However, the reality is far from being that straightforward.

Returning to adherence to the deal is a multilayered process fraught with complexities and areas of potential disagreements.

The Biden administration has said it would remove sanctions that are inconsistent with the JCPOA, which grants relief for nuclear-related restrictions. That would not include terrorism and human rights sanctions.

Since 2015, Trump imposed more than 1,000 sanctions on Iran, and Biden added a few of his own.

The Biden administration has expressed willingness to remove some sanctions not officially labelled as nuclear. But Iran said it wants all sanctions revoked.

And so, the two countries have to agree on the scope of sanction relief. Even then, sanctions cannot be undone with the stroke of a pen. Removing them can be a lengthy process that involves several government agencies.

For Iran, returning to compliance does not only mean dropping the nuclear enrichment levels but also getting rid of the existing stockpiles of highly enriched uranium and advanced centrifuges and reinstating the stringent international inspection regime with the IAEA.

Moreover, the nuclear know-how gained during the escalation of Irans programme may not be reversible.

At the talks in Vienna, the parties established working groups to address these issues. In April, then-Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, a pragmatic moderate, said the negotiations had advanced about 70 percent in resolving disagreements.

But the conservative side of the Iranian leadership, including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has recently expressed dissatisfaction with the way the talks proceeded.

In a series of tweets late in August, Khamenei said the Raisi administration should forge friendly relations with other nations independently of the nuclear talks.

Diplomacy should not be impacted by the nuclear issue. In the nuclear issue, the US acted extremely shamelessly. he wrote. They withdrew from the #JCPOA but talked as if Iran had withdrawn from it. They ridiculed the negotiations. The Europeans acted like the US, too.

Biden, too, is touting other options to confront Iran and its nuclear programme if JCPOA talks fail.

Sina Toossi, a senior research analyst at the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), warned that tensions between Tehran and Washington could intensify if the nuclear issue is not resolved.

If this new team from Iran is going to be demanding greater concessions and Biden is unwilling to give them, then were going to enter this mutual escalation phase again, Toossi told Al Jazeera.

He said Iran could further increase uranium enrichment, and the US this time with EU backing would bolster international sanctions.

Such an escalatory cycle can bring the sides to the brink of war if they do not agree on realistic bottom-line interests, Toossi added.

We have to decipher what those bottom-line interests are for each side, he said. And what exactly is the Biden administration willing to give, what exactly is Iran looking to get; where are they willing to meet on common grounds? It is unclear where that is.

For her part, Mortazavi faulted both sides for failing to find a solution, saying that the Biden administration continued to drive Trumps moving train of maximum pressure since it took office in January.

And on the Iranian side, the change in the administration has moved Iran in a political direction even farther from where they could meet halfway, Mortazavi said.

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Iran nuclear deal: Whats next for the JCPOA? | Joe Biden ...