U.S. Sanctions Iranian Officials Over Plots to Assassinate American Officials

The U.S. Treasury Department announced sanctions against two Iranian intelligence officials for allegedly recruiting individuals for assassination operations targeting U.S. officials.

Working on behalf of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security, Majid Dastjani Farahani and Mohammad Mahdi Kanpour Ardestani “recruited individuals for various operations in the United States, to include lethal targeting of current and former U.S. Government officials as revenge for the death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force Commander Qasem Soleimani,” the Treasury said Friday. “Farahani and Ardestani also recruited individuals for surveillance activities focused on religious sites, businesses, and other facilities in the United States.”

The sanctions against Farahani and Ardestani were announced alongside sanctions against people in Afghanistan, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Liberia, China, South Sudan and Uganda. The Treasury said it purposely announced the sanctions days before the 75th anniversary of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was signed on Dec.10, 1948.