The US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned four individuals and nine entities tied to an Iranian financial evasion network on Friday, according to a press release on the department’s website.
The network, run by Iran-linked financier Babak Zanjani, enabled the Islamic regime to evade sanctions and pursue actions that destabilize the region, OFAC stated.
In addition, the network also provided support to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) through Zanjani’s digital asset companies, such as Zedcex and Zedxion, the department said.
Revenue methods used by Zanjani to finance the regime included financial services, gold and precious gem production, digital asset trading, and major transportation and infrastructure projects, the Treasury said.
Zanjani had previously been found guilty of embezzlement in an Iranian court in 2016, a charge for which he was sentenced to death, the statement noted, with his sentence commuted in 2024.
His 2025 reemergence as a financier for Tehran was described by the Treasury Department as a demonstration of “the lengths to which Iranian state-affiliated elites will go to preserve access to the international financial system so that they can enrich themselves, even as they mismanage the Iranian economy.”
According to the department, the sanctions are part of a broader effort enacted through Executive Order 13902, which targets Iranian financial, petroleum, and petrochemical sectors to prevent the funding of the regime’s nuclear, missile, and terror activities.
Sanctions to ‘further pressure’ Iran after regional attacks
The department emphasized that the new sanctions would “further pressure” Iran following its recent drone and missile attacks on countries across the Middle East, as well as ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz.
“The Iranian regime continues to pay a steep economic price for its reckless behavior, with the rial plunging to another record low and inflation up massively,” said US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. “Under President Trump’s leadership, Treasury will continue cutting off economic access for corrupt Iranian regime elites, along with their financiers and facilitators.”
‘World’s leading state sponsor of terror’
The statement included a call for governments and financial institutions worldwide to avoid engaging with Zanjani or his network, as well as other networks connected to Iran.
“The Iranian regime is the world’s leading state sponsor of terror, and for more than 40 years has used the IRGC to foment instability in the region and beyond. We will continue to expose and disrupt networks that provide the regime and its proxies with the resources they use to undermine US national security interests,” the statement concluded.
