Tehran, Iran – Iran has imposed new sanctions on individuals and entities in the European Union and the United Kingdom in response to their human rights sanctions and comments on the country’s ongoing protests.
The Iranian foreign ministry on Monday announced sanctions on nine entities and 23 individuals, including media institutions, a military base, and current and former politicians.
Falling under the purview of the EU, Tehran extended its targeting of foreign-based media organisations by blacklisting Radio Farda, the Iran-focused branch of the United States government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, in addition to Amsterdam-based Radio Zamaneh and French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Two German companies, Water Engineering Trading GmbH and Gidlemeister Projekta GmbH, were blacklisted because they “participated in manufacturing” chemical weapons used by Saddam Hussein during the eight-year Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s.
The EU-related sanctions on individuals were mostly focused on German politicians, targeting several former lawmakers, in addition to Bernard Kouchner, an influential French politician and doctor and co-founder of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).
On the UK side, Iran blacklisted the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change and targeted several current members of parliament in addition to Geoffrey Bindman, the chair of the British Institute of Human Rights.
Soleimani assassination
Several of the sanctions on EU and UK institutions and officials appeared to be related to the January 2020 assassination of Iran’s top general, Qassem Soleimani, in Iraq’s capital Baghdad.
The commander of the Quds Force, the foreign operations arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), was killed by a missile from a drone attack ordered by the US, but Tehran has since also condemned Germany, the UK, and Israel for playing a part.
The Iranian foreign ministry on Monday blacklisted Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, who was Germany’s defence minister from 2019 to 2021, in addition to a commander of German forces in Iraq and a commander at the Ramstein Air Base.
It also targeted the RAF Menwith Hill, the British Royal Air Force base in North Yorkshire allegedly involved in the assassination, and several British military and intelligence officials.
The Iranian foreign ministry imposed its first-ever sanctions on the first anniversary of Soleimani’s assassination in 2021, targeting former US President Donald Trump and others. It later expanded that list.
‘Political pressure’
Iran imposed sanctions on a number of other EU and UK officials in October, retaliating against their human rights sanctions that European officials said are aimed at punishing the “brutal repression” of Iran’s ongoing protests.
The protests began in mid-September after the death of Mahsa Amini, a young woman who was arrested in Tehran by the country’s morality police for allegedly not adhering to a mandatory dress code.
Iran on Monday carried out a second execution linked with the unrest, publicly hanging from a crane a man who was convicted of killing two members of the security forces with a knife. The US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand have also sanctioned Iranian officials and entities over their response to the protests, during which hundreds have been killed.
Tehran has rejected this, in addition to a vote last month to establish a UN fact-finding mission and an upcoming vote on Wednesday to expel it from the UN Commission on the Rights of Women as foreign interference.
“We stress that intervening in the internal affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran will not go without reaction,” foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani told reporters on Monday, adding Tehran will not bow to “political pressure” from the West.
Tehran’s sanctions include an entry ban into Iran and confiscation of any assets they may possess in the country.
