US treasury department accepts business with Iran though it calls permitted trade was inconsequential compared with the broad scope of US sanctions; Iran’s arms smuggler detained by NATO
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    • The US treasury department has granted nearly 10,000 exceptions to American companies over the past decade so that they could skirt US sanctions on Iran and other countries the US considers terrorist sponsors. Most licenses were granted under a law allowing trade in humanitarian goods, even if that ended up including products as diverse as cigarettes and chewing gum. Reports noted that one American company was allowed to bid on a pipeline job to help Iran sell natural gas to Europe even though the US opposes such deals. US treasury officials noted that the permitted trade was inconsequential compared with the broad scope of US sanctions, as goods sold to Iran amounted to only 0.02 percent of all US exports in the first quarter of this year.1

    A man has been held suspected of helping to smuggle arms from Iran across the border for the Taliban in Afghanistan. A statement described him as a “key Taliban weapons facilitator”. However, NATO has clarified that he is not a member of the elite al-Quds force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards as suggested by its initial reports.2

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