The Treasury said the two Iraqi nationals, as well as the South Wealth Resources Company in Baghdad, are linked to the overseas branch of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, or the Qods Force.
"The IRGC-QF has used Iraq-based SWRC, also known as Manabea Tharwat al-Janoob General Trading Company, as a front to smuggle hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of weapons to its proxies inside Iraq," the Treasury said in a press release.
SWRC and the two individuals - Makki Kazim ‘Abd Al Hamid Al Asadi (Makki Kazim Al Asadi) and Muhammed Husayn Salih al-Hasani - have also covertly facilitated the IRGC-QF’s access to the Iraqi financial system to evade sanctions, the release added.
"This scheme also served to enrich previously sanctioned Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, an Iraqi advisor to IRGC-QF Commander Qasem Soleimani, who has run weapons smuggling networks and participated in bombings of Western embassies and attempted assassinations in the region," the Treasury said. Muhandis is already subject to US sanctions.
Since pulling out of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as the Iran nuclear deal, last May, the US has reinstated all sanctions against Tehran and introduced more.
Furthermore, US National Security Advisor John Bolton announced on May 5 that Washington was deploying an aircraft carrier strike group and a bomber task force to the Middle East to send a "clear and unmistakable message" to Iran that any attack on American interests or those of its allies would be met with "unrelenting force".
