The United States has blacklisted prominent Turkish businessman Sitki Ayan for allegedly operating a trading network that facilitated oil sales on behalf of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).
Ayan's companies have established international sales contracts for Iranian oil, arranged shipments, helped launder the proceeds, and obscured the origin of the oil on behalf of Iran's Quds Force, an arm of the IRGC, the U.S. Treasury said on December 8 in a statement.
Ayan, his son, Bahaddin Ayan, and Kasim Oztas, a senior official of ASB Group, a Gibraltar-registered holding company for several businesses controlled by Ayan, were all designated for sanctions in an action that the Treasury said supplements one in May targeting other elements of the network.
That network facilitated the sale of Iranian oil for both the IRGC Quds Force and Hizballah with the backing of senior levels of the Russian government and state-run entities, Treasury said.
Ayan used the network of his Gibraltar-registered ASB Group, which was also blacklisted by the Treasury on December 8, to hide the origins of the oil and the destination of the payments, Treasury said.
Bahaddin Ayan directs and owns shares in at least five ASB Group-associated companies, while Oztas "directly handles much of Ayan's business," the department said.
It said Ayan has helped the Quds Force by arranging the sale and shipment of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of oil the IRGC controls to China and other East Asian buyers, Europe, and the United Arab Emirates.
He has also helped move the proceeds from the sales to the IRGC, the Treasury said.
Ayan also used one of his companies to buy a Panamanian-flagged liquefied natural gas tanker for the IRGC, it said.
The Treasury also placed around 20 companies in the ASB Group and Ayan-affiliated companies on its blacklist. The sanctions freeze any assets the individuals or companies have under U.S. jurisdiction, inhibits their access to global financial markets, and bars people based in the U.S. from dealing with them.
Ayan, his son, and Oztas were not immediately available for comment, Reuters reported. Ayan's ASB Group and Turkey’s Directorate of Communications did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Washington maintains sweeping sanctions on Iran and has looked for ways to increase pressure as efforts to resurrect a 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran have stalled.
The agreement limited Iran's uranium enrichment activity to make it harder for Tehran to develop nuclear arms in return for lifting international sanctions. U.S. President Joe Biden sought to negotiate the return of Iran to the nuclear deal after former President Donald Trump pulled out of the agreement in 2018. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.
