October 11, 2018
SWIFT
Must End Its Services In Iran
(New York, NY) - United
Against Nuclear Iran today called upon
the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication
(SWIFT) to terminate its relationship with the Iranian banking
system. Since 1973, almost all international bank transfers have been
facilitated by SWIFT, a Brussels-based organization that connects
more than 11,000 banks and other financial institutions and processes
30 million transaction messages each day.
In letters to
the SWIFT organization and the major American and European banks that
comprise its leadership board, UANI said it was critical that SWIFT
"terminate its relationship with all Iranian Banks and Financial
Institutions currently connected to the SWIFT network."
Since 2004,
16 European banks, including SWIFT members, have been fined a total
of almost $3.5 billion by U.S. authorities for violating Iran
financial sanctions.
From 2012 to
2016 and consistent with global sanctions, SWIFT responsibly barred
Iranian access to its banking system. However, with the signing of the
Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), SWIFT reconnected most
Iranian banks to the system, including Bank Mellat, Bank Melli, Bank
Pasargad, Bank Tejerat, Bank Saderat, Ansar Bank, Mehr Eqtesad Bank,
and Parsian Bank. SWIFT also reconnected the Central Bank of Iran,
whose ex-Governor Valiollah Seif and Assistant Director were recently
designated by the U.S. Treasury as Specially Designated Global
Terrorists for helping the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Council-Quds
Force funnel millions of dollars to the terrorist organization
Hezbollah.
Clearly, rather than moderating its behavior and becoming a
nation worthy of foreign investment since the adoption of the JCPOA,
the Iranian regime has chosen to fund terrorist proxies Hezbollah,
Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Shiite militias, fomenting violence and
instability throughout the Middle East.
With the
reimposition of sweeping sanctions on the Iranian banking system and
its well-documented ties to terrorist groups, UANI is calling on
SWIFT to revert to its 2012-2016 policy of excluding Iran. The
Islamic Republic uses deception and subterfuge to fund its illicit
activities, threatening the integrity and security of the
international financial system. Although it has been urged for years
to adopt a more stringent regulatory framework, the Iranian regime at
the highest levels has refused to implement the necessary reforms to
comply with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing
standards.
UANI asked
the SWIFT members to respond to the question posed on September 25 by
National Security Advisor John Bolton: "How can this enterprise
[SWIFT] justify facilitating the evil escapades of the world's
leading state sponsor of terror?"
SWIFT's
ongoing service to sanction-designated Iranian financial institutions
from November 5, 2018 is likely to breach its own prohibitions on the
use of SWIFT services and products "for illegal, illicit or
fraudulent purposes" and in ensuring that "no laws or
regulations regarding banking, money transmission, securities, money
laundering, terrorist financing, [and] economic sanctions" are
violated, UANI wrote.
The UANI
letters also warned against attempts by some European Union
politicians to establish independent payment channels to circumvent
U.S. sanctions on Iran. "These unprincipled, albeit vague,
attempts to marginalize the United States and genuflect to Iran are
unconscionable," UANI said. "European diplomatic and
financial support of a pathologically anti-U.S. terror state
dedicated to the destruction of America is, at best, myopic and, at
worst, blatantly antagonistic to its friend, ally, or partner.
Furthermore, any payment system that excludes the U.S. - especially
one lacking the institutional expertise of the Office of Foreign
Assets Control - will be, on its face, far less rigorous in terms of
anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism."
In the weeks and months after President Trump announced the
U.S. withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA),
dozens of businesses in the U.S. and Europe that had been involved in
the Iranian market announced, despite protestations from EU officials
in Brussels, that they would be shuttering their operations in the
country. Renault, Volkswagen, Total,
Volvo, Siemens, and other well-known corporations have
announced their intention to void their nascent relationships with
Iran. Interestingly, the European
business community has been joined by leaders in central and south
Asia and Taiwan in determining that despite the diplomatic and
economic ties between their countries and Iran, their companies would
no longer subject their companies to the myriad financial,
reputational and security risks of engaging in the Iranian market.
"It is a credit to their good judgment and risk
assessment capacity that these companies are voluntarily deciding to
avoid the stain of supporting a regime like Iran's with cash and
legitimacy," said UANI CEO Ambassador Mark D. Wallace. "These
companies are leaving Iran or resolving to forego the risk until the
regime in Tehran changes its behavior. The leaders of SWIFT should,
consistent with its own rules, refuse to allow Iran, the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism - to
flaunt international banking
standards in support of its nefarious behavior."
To read the
UANI letter to SWIFT, please click here.
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