Charges Filed Against Three Iranians in U.S. Federal Court for 'Sanctions Violations'

A federal court in Cleveland, Ohio, has charged three Iranian citizens for 'violating' unilateral U.S. sanctions and participating in the sale of prohibited goods and their shipment to Iran. According to the local website 'Cleveland.com', a 52-year-old Iranian woman named Parisa Mohammadi was arrested in the U.S. last week in connection with this case. The report also mentions two other Iranians, Mohammad Khodrayi Shahnavaz and Arzu Hashemi Nejad Alamdar, as well as a registered company in Canada under Mr. Shahnavaz's supervision. The federal court has accused these three Iranian citizens of violating U.S. sanctions against the Islamic Republic between 2010 and 2012, being involved in the sale of three million dollars' worth of goods and their transfer to Iran. According to U.S. federal officials in their indictment, these individuals initially sent the mentioned goods, which were used in the oil, gas, and energy industries, to the United Arab Emirates and Turkey before shipping them to Iran. The case against these individuals was submitted to the court in January of this year, but the news has only recently come to light. As the issue of sanctions against Iran intensified, especially during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency, the circumvention of these sanctions and the shipment of necessary goods to the country, particularly in the fields of oil, energy, and nuclear, also flourished. This led to several individuals, most of whom were Iranian citizens, being tried in the U.S. or other countries like Germany and France for violating U.S. sanctions, ultimately ending up in prison. Following the signing of the nuclear agreement between the Islamic Republic and the 1+5 countries in the summer of 2015 and the lifting or suspension of some sanctions, the number of these individuals decreased, but news about their trials still occasionally emerges. The U.S., which has always opposed Iran's missile and nuclear programs, agreed to lift some sanctions related to the nuclear program under the so-called JCPOA. However, the U.S. still maintains sanctions against other areas, including Iran's military industries. In this context, an Iranian in the UAE was sentenced to 10 years in prison for 'violating sanctions'. New sanctions against Iran were approved in the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Zarif reacted to the new U.S. sanctions, stating that they poison relations. The U.S. fined ExxonMobil for violating sanctions against Russia.