Iranian officials on Friday slammed a U.S. expansion of a sanctions blacklist of companies and people claimed to be linked to Iran's alleged nuclear program, with Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi declaring it "
against the spirit of the Geneva deal."
"We are evaluating the situation and Iran will react accordingly to the new sanctions imposed on 19 companies and individuals," Araghchi, Iran's deputy foreign minister, told the Iranian Fars news agency on Friday.
The late November interim agreement between Iran and the P5+1 nations required Iran to freeze its nuclear program, despite no evidence of nuclear weapons development, in exchange for a slight--and critics charge grossly insufficient--easing of sanctions in a bid to buy time for more talks.
The deal unleashed a wave of hope in Iran that an easing of US-led sanctions would alleviate severe economic hardship and shortages of medical supplies and equipment that hit Iran's poor and working classes the hardest.
Yet, immediately following the agreement, the U.S. vowed to escalate enforcement of the sanctions that remained, the Christian Science Monitorreports.
Meanwhile, members of Congress are calling for more severe sanctions on Iran--a move that critics charge could jeopardize the deal and increase the risk of a regional war with dangerous and unknown consequences. The congressional move appears to be in step with vigorous efforts by both Israel and Saudi Arabia to prevent a deal with Iran.
Robert Naiman, policy director for Just Foreign Policy, told Common Dreams that the U.S. expansion of the black list is likely a bid on the part of the Obama administration to "stave off congressional action."
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