Washington, April 28, (dpa/GNA) – The United States is imposing new sanctions on Russia and Iran due to “unlawful arrests,” with measures to affect the Russian secret service FSB and the intelligence service of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
“Our actions are a clear and direct warning to those around the world who wrongfully detain US nationals,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement on Thursday.
“We are also showing that one cannot engage in this sort of awful behavior of using human beings as pawns as bargaining chips without paying consequences,” Blinken added.
The announcement comes after the arrest of US reporter Evan Gershkovich for alleged espionage in Russia recently caused a stir. The Wall Street Journal correspondent was taken into custody by the FSB in the Urals at the end of March.
Russian authorities accuse him of espionage on behalf of the US government, a charge Gershkovich, the newspaper and Washington deny.
The US government stressed that the new sanctions package had already been worked on before Gershkovich’s arrest. Also imprisoned in Russia is US citizen Paul Whelan. He was convicted in 2018 for alleged espionage.
Iran also repeatedly imprisons foreigners on charges of espionage or other national security offences. Among its best-known US detainees is businessman Siamak Namasi, who holds dual citizenship. The 51-year-old was imprisoned together with his father Bagher Namasi in 2015 and then sentenced to 10 years in jail for espionage.
The elder Namasi was released in 2022 under an agreement with Washington. However, his son is still in the notorious Ewin prison in Tehran.
In addition to the IRGC’s intelligence services as a whole, the US is also imposing sanctions on four senior members of the unit as part of the new package. One consequence of the sanctions is that any assets of those affected in the US will be frozen and business with those on the list will be prohibited for US citizens.
The US already lists the IRGC as a terror organization and has also sanctioned the Russian FSB before.
GNA