EU issues Iran sanctions, warns of "implications" of terror plot

The European Union on Wednesday issued fresh sanctions against three Iranian ministers and 26 others, while warning separately that Iran could face "serious international implications" over a terrorist plot in the United States, dpa reported.

US officials allege that the Middle Eastern country was behind plans to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to Washington. Two men with links to Iran and its Revolutionary Guard have been charged in connection with the plot, officials announced on Tuesday.

"Should the facts be confirmed, this would constitute a serious breach of international law with serious international implications," a spokeswoman for Catherine Ashton, the EU's foreign policy chief, told reporters in Brussels.

The fresh EU sanctions implemented on Wednesday were agreed before news of the plot emerged. They were meant to respond to "profound concern at the deteriorating human rights situation" in the country.

Among those now prevented from travelling to the EU or accessing assets there are Justice Minister Seyyed Morteza Bakhtiari, Culture Minister Mohammad Hosseini and Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi.

The EU accuses Bakhtiari of playing "a key role in threatening and harassing the Iranian diaspora," while Hosseini is said to be "complicit in the repression of journalists."

Moslehi, meanwhile, "bears responsibility for ongoing abuse" because he oversees a ministry involved in the "widespread arbitrary detention and persecution of protesters and dissidents," the EU wrote in its official journal.

A former interior minister, Sadeq Mahsouli, is also facing sanctions because security forces he oversaw were involved in attacking and torturing students, according to the EU.

The other people targeted include a cohort of political, military, police and judicial leaders, as well as prison officials, prosecutors and the head of the government-linked group responsible for what the EU says is "an intensive cyber-crackdown" in and outside Iran.


/Trend/