State Dept. Mum on Status of Iraq-Iran Sanctions Waiver
Although President Donald Trump has ordered his administration to reimpose maximum sanctions pressure against Iran, a State Department spokesperson on March 6 declined to say whether the U.S. plans to allow a waiver to expire this week that has authorized exports to Iraq of Iranian gas and electricity.
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State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said the license was scheduled to lapse March 8. “At this point, as you might imagine, we have nothing to announce with regards to the current electricity waiver,” Bruce said during a press conference. She said the agency is “reviewing all existing sanctions waivers that provide Iran any degree of economic or financial relief, and we are urging the Iraqi government to eliminate its dependence on Iranian sources of energy as soon as possible.”
The waiver has been renewed multiple times for four-month periods in recent years (see 2312140056).
A national security memorandum Trump signed in February called on the State and Treasury departments to consider revoking any general license or guidance document that gives “Iran or any of its terror proxies any degree of economic or financial relief” (see 2502050020). It also called on Treasury and other agencies to make sure Iran isn’t using the Iraqi financial system to evade sanctions.