UK draws up new sanctions on ‘hostile’ Iran

MI6 said there were 10 ‘potential threats’ by Tehran to kidnap or kill British citizens or residents last year.

‘Today the UK has sent a clear message: we will not tolerate this malign behaviour’: James Cleverly this week. Picture: AFP

Britain is to create a new sanctions regime focused specifically on Iran in response to a heightened risk of attacks inside the UK.

The plan, announced by Foreign Secretary James Cleverly overnight on Thursday, is said to have been prompted by Iran’s “malign behaviour”, with no sign of a let-up in its threats to Britain.

At the end of last year Ken McCallum, director-general of the MI5 domestic intelligence agency, said there had been 10 “potential threats” to kidnap or kill British citizens or residents last year, with more plots this year. Mr Cleverly told The Times: “We are not going to witness this level of attempted aggression against the UK without taking action.”

The new sanctions regimen will replace the patchwork of rules under which Britain can impose sanctions on Iranian officials and organisations such as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. More than 350 officials or entities are already under sanctions.

Some politicians and members of the Revolutionary Guard can be targeted under laws aimed at human rights abusers.

These have been deployed most recently against those involved in the crackdown on protests against mandatory hijab wearing since last northern autumn. Others are meted out under international terrorism rules, meaning specific legal definitions have to be met.

Some sanctions are in accordance with UN restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. A number of those will expire in October under the 2015 nuclear deal, which Britain and EU states observe despite then president Donald Trump having scrapped US involvement.

The new sanctions regime will be more akin to that used against Russia; essentially treating Iran as an inherently hostile state. To go before parliament this year, it will provide four broad justifications for sanctions: activities undermining peace, stability and security in the Middle East and internationally; using and exporting weapons and weapons technology; undermining democracy, the rule of law and good governance; and hostile activities towards the UK and “partners”, including threats to people, property or security.

The policy will make it easier to target Iranians involved in supporting anti-Israeli militias such as Hezbollah.

The nuclear deal, overseen by then-president Barack Obama and negotiated by the permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany, was intended to herald a new era of co-operation with Tehran. It failed, however, to reduce mistrust, especially as Iran resumed arrests of Western citizens such as Britain’s Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and continued to threaten Israel. It also plotted and in at least two cases is thought to have succeeded in carrying out assassinations on European soil.

Restrictions on Iran’s missile development program under the deal, which Iran never observed, are due to expire in October, meaning Britain and the EU have to decide whether to maintain these specific sanctions.

Britain says it is leading the way in challenging Iran over both its human rights record and its arms exports, including to Russia and the Houthi rebels fighting a civil war in Yemen.

“The Iranian regime is oppressing its own people, exporting bloodshed in Ukraine and the Middle East, and threatening to kill and kidnap on UK soil,” Mr Cleverly said. “Today the UK has sent a clear message: we will not tolerate this malign behaviour.”

Iran said it had summoned the British charge d’affaires, according to a local journalist, and said the UK’s action was “interventionist” and “destructive”.

The Times