The U.S. Treasury Department yesterday announced a new set of sanctions targeting Iran’s oil industry, with the aim of trying to reduce Iran’s oil exports to zero. The U.S. is “imposing sanctions on over 30 persons and vessels in multiple jurisdictions for their role in brokering the sale and transportation of Iranian petroleum-related products. Among those sanctioned today are oil brokers in the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) and Hong Kong, tanker operators and managers in India and People’s Republic of China (P.R.C.), the head of Iran’s National Iranian Oil Company, and the Iranian Oil Terminals Company, whose operations help finance Iran’s destabilizing activities,” Treasury said in a statement.
The new sanctions are being imposed pursuant to two executive orders imposing the maximum- pressure policy that President Donald Trump had issued during his first term, in 2018, after he pulled the U.S. out of the 2015 nuclear deal, and in 2020. Trump resumed the maximum- pressure policy with National Security Presidential Memorandum 2 issued on Feb. 4, 2025.
In Tehran, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi replied by vowing that Iran will not negotiate as long as the “maximum pressure” policy is in place. “We will coordinate our positions on the nuclear issue in cooperation with our friends in Russia and China. Iran’s stance on the nuclear negotiations is crystal clear: We will not negotiate under pressure, threat, or sanctions,” he said at a joint press conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who arrived in Tehran for talks with Iranian officials earlier on Feb. 25, reported IRNA. “Therefore, there will be no possibility of direct negotiations between us and the United States on the nuclear issue as long as ‘maximum pressure’ is enforced in its current form,” he added.
