Iran Set Up Clandestine Finance System

“Iran es­tab­lished a clan­des­tine bank­ing and fi­nance sys­tem to han­dle tens of bil­lions of dol­lars in an­nual trade banned un­der U.S.-led sanc­tions, en­abling Tehran to en­dure the eco­nomic siege and giv­ing it lever­age in mul­ti­lat­eral nu­clear talks,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The sys­tem, which com­prises ac­counts in for­eign com­mer­cial banks, proxy com­pa­nies reg­is-tered out­side the coun­try, firms that co­or­di­nate the banned trade, and a trans­ac­tion clear­ing­house within Iran, has helped Tehran re­sist the Biden ad­min­is­tra­tion’s pres­sure to re­join the 2015 nu­clear deal, buy­ing it time to ad­vance its nu­clear pro­gram even while ne­go­ti­a­tions were un­der way. Of­fi­cials say they are clos­ing in on a deal, with the re­lease of two British women in re­cent days fore­shad­ow­ing a po­ten­tial agree­ment within days.”