US warns countries to end all financial dealings with Iran or face punishment

Washington: The US is issuing deadlines to countries to stop all financial dealings with Iran as part of a new “Operation Economic Outcast” aimed at isolating the Islamic regime in Tehran from the rest of the world.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said President Donald Trump was calling his global counterparts with specific demands regarding their commercial interactions with Iran. If they fail to comply, their institutions face exclusion from the US financial system.

“Our objective is to sever every economic lifeline that sustains this tyrannical regime until Tehran stands alone,” Bessent said at a news conference in Washington on Monday (US time).

“It is no longer acceptable to operate in the grey spaces of this conflict … Any entity that facilitates money laundering on behalf of Iran will be removed from the US dollar system. The clock just started ticking.”

In a speech that was heavy on threatening rhetoric, Bessent likened the announcement to an economic “D-Day” – the start of the allied invasion of Nazi-controlled Europe during World War II.

But he provided few specifics, and did not unveil any immediate secondary sanctions against other countries or banks. He said it was likely that a major financial institution would be hit with sanctions by the end of the week.

Asked why the US was not imposing secondary sanctions straight away, Bessent said: “We are giving everyone the opportunity to remedy bad behaviour. Why would I want to blow up the global financial system?”

The US has so far resisted targeting Chinese banks and intermediaries, which process the bulk of Iranian oil sales. Trump has a high-stakes meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the White House in September.

Bessent suggested Chinese banks would not be immune from sanctions, but said the US preferred to engage in “quiet diplomacy” with other countries.

“If they facilitate transactions and are part of the ecosystem that turns Iranian oil into money – into repression – they will be targeted,” he said.

Several new measures were announced on Monday, including sanctions against nearly 60 Iran-linked entities, individuals and vessels.

That included a procurement scheme for Iran’s ballistic missile development and nuclear research, a malicious cyber group and a network of brokers and vessels transporting Iranian oil, Treasury said.

And the US expanded its list of sectoral sanctions against Iran. Anyone operating in the fields of digital assets, technology, gold, aviation and shipping was now liable to be sanctioned.

Bessent said that every branch of Iran’s Bank Melli – the largest regime-controlled commercial bank – must be “shuttered and dark”.