The United States blacklisted on Wednesday several Iranian state groups for their serious human rights abuses.
In the latest of a series of actions meant to increase pressure on the Tehran regime, the Treasury department named the semi-official paramilitary group Ansar-e-Hezbollah and three of its leaders to its sanctions list.
The goal is to lock those who are blacklisted out of the global financial and commercial system.
Ansar-e-Hezbollah is "an organization supported by the Iranian regime that harasses and attacks the Iranian people," the Treasury said, citing its role in acid attacks against women seen as improperly dressed in Isfahan, and other violent attacks on student protestors.
It has been involved in the violent suppression of Iranian citizens and has collaborated with the Basij to violently attack Iranian students with knives, tear gas, and electric batons.
The Treasury also sanctioned Tehran's Evin Prison, used to house political prisoners, saying people held there are subject to sexual assaults, physical assaults and electric shock.
Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps maintain permanent wards in Evin Prison where they hold political prisoners, said the Treasury on its website. And while senior regime officials regularly downplay the torture and abuse that occurs in Evin Prison, the abuse of prisoners, including political prisoners, continues once sham inspections into the prison conditions end.
Two Iranian government officials involved in censorship, including blocking the popular encrypted messaging app Telegram, and a government-linked tech unit, Hanista Programing Group, were also placed on the sanctions blacklist.
Hanista, the Treasury said, creates and distributes messaging apps meant to be alternatives to Telegram but which allow the government to monitor and track users' phones.
“Those who speak out against the regime’s mismanagement and corruption are subject to abuse and mistreatment in Iran’s prisons. America stands with the people of Iran, and Treasury is taking action to hold the Iranian regime accountable for ongoing human rights abuses, censorship, and other despicable acts it commits against its own citizens,” said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin in a statement.
“Iran not only exports terrorism and instability across the world, it routinely violates the rights of its own people. The Iranian regime diverts national resources that should belong to the people to fund a massive and expensive censorship apparatus and suppress free speech,” he added.
Wednesday's announcement added to a series of moves to increase political and economic pressure on Tehran after President Donald Trump's May 8 decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear accord.
