EU targets dozens of Iranian individuals, entities over “rights violation”

In a press release issued on Monday, the EU Council said it has decided to impose restrictive measures on additional 32 Iranian individuals and two entities in a fifth round of sanctions over what the bloc claimed to be Tehran’s crackdown on protests, sparked following the death of Mahsa Amini in September.

Foreign-backed riots broke out in Iran in mid-September after the death of the 22-year-old Iranian woman in police custody. She fainted at a police station in Tehran and was pronounced dead three days later in a hospital.

Iran’s intelligence community has announced several countries, including the United States and the UK, have used their spy and propaganda apparatuses to provoke violent riots in the country.

According to the EU press release, Iran’s minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance, Mohammad Mehdi Esmaeili, and Minister of Education Yousef Nouri, the deputy commander and spokesperson of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), a number of MPs, members of the police, judiciary in various parts of the country, and prison wardens and directors are among the persons listed.

The 27-nation bloc also imposed sanctions on the co-founders of EU-listed Ravin Academy, an Iran-based cyber security company.

The designations also targeted the Law Enforcement Forces Cooperation Foundation and the Police Science and Social Studies Institute.

The EU restrictive measures now apply to a total of 196 individuals and 33 entities, consisting of an asset freeze, a travel ban to the EU and a prohibition to make funds or economic resources available to those listed.

A ban on exports to Iran of equipment which might be used for monitoring telecommunications is also in place.

Britain, too, on Monday added eight new designations to its sanctions list relating to Iran, some targeting the country’s judges for what it claimed were human rights violations.

According to an update to the British government website, the IRGC members were also included in the sanctions.