BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – ONCE again St. Kitts and Nevis has been featured in articles published by a number of international media houses. This time, however, the news is about accusation linking to citizens of the Federation helping Iran to covert various currencies into hundreds of millions of US dollars.
According to an article published by the Associated Press (AP) yesterday (Dec. 30), headlined “US Treasury enforces Iranian sanctions”, the US Treasury Department had imposed economic penalties on six people and three companies accused of helping the Government of Iran to obtain hundreds of millions in US currency or evade existing sanctions.
These sanctions, AP said, were enforced yesterday.
“Those accused of helping Iran convert various currencies into hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars include Iranians, citizens of Afghanistan and St. Kitts and Nevis and a Dubai-based trading company. Iran's Douran Software Technologies is targeted for helping government censorship activities. Another tech firm, Abyssec, is blamed for supporting Iran's Revolutionary Guard corps in cyber tradecraft,” AP said.
It added that Americans cannot do business with those blacklisted, and any assets they have in the US are now frozen.
The media house quoted David Cohen, the Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, as saying: “The action shows that the Obama administration is serious about enforcing sanctions already on the books even though it does not support additional sanctions while the US and its partners work to negotiate with Iran over its nuclear program.”
AP noted that the US President has threatened to veto any new sanctions legislation, while American diplomats continue their push for an accord that would set multiyear limits on Iran's nuclear progress in exchange for an easing of the international sanctions that have crippled the Iranian economy.
It also noted that “Senate hawks are still trying to build a veto-proof majority of 67 votes with Republicans set to assume the majority next month”.
In a Reuters report on the matter, the media house said that US Treasury officials stated that those accused of helping Iran include: “former Iranian citizen Hossein Zeidi and Iranian Seyed Kamal Yasini, who U.S. officials said helped convert Iranian money into local currency and then into U.S. dollars; Azizullah Asadullah Qulandary, an Afghanistan citizen who helped deliver those dollars to the Iranian government. Asadollah Seifi, Teymour Ameri and Dubai-based Belfast General Trading also delivered U.S. currency to the Iranian government”.
The media house also noted that according to the Department, Asia Bank official Anahita Nasirbeik, an Iranian, also was designated for supporting the Central Bank of Iran or the Iranian government's efforts in acquiring or buying US bank notes.
Although the names of those accused of helping Iran in converting various currencies into hundreds of millions into US dollars, there was no mention of the person or person who are citizens of St. Kitts and Nevis.
