By Pooya Stone

The world’s anti-money laundering and terror-financing body reimposed a restriction on Iran on Friday for failing to comply with financial transparency efforts, despite being given multiple opportunities.

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) called on all members and their jurisdictions to require increased “supervisory examination” of Iran-based branches and subsidiaries of their banks. This restriction had been suspended for three years.

FATF was responding to what US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told their meeting in Orlando, Florida, was Iran’s “willful failure to address its systemic money laundering and terrorist financing deficiencies”.

By Pooya Stone

The US issued sanctions against Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other top Iranian officials on Monday, increasing pressure on Iran after the country shot down a US drone last week.

Donald Trump signed an executive order to impose the sanctions, which US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said will freeze billions of dollars more in Iranian assets.

Trump said this was in response to the drone attack, but would have happened anyway due to the “hostile conduct of the regime” in the Middle East.

By Jubin Katiraie

The US military’s cyber forces launched a digital strike against Iran’s military computer systems on Thursday, at roughly the same time that Donald Trump cancelled a conventional military strike in retaliation for Iran’s takedown of a US surveillance drone.

Two US officials said that the cyber strikes were approved by Trump, while a third provided the outlines. The trio spoke anonymously because they are not authorized to speak publicly about the action.

By Pooya Stone

Over the weekend, US Vice President Mike Pence appeared on CBS’s “Face the Nation” to talk about the threat posed by the Iranian government and the Free Iran rally that took place in Washington DC on Friday.

Journalist Margaret Brennan asked Pence if the US had conducted cyber operations against Iran in response for shooting down a US drone last week, but Pence declined to comment as it was a covert operation.

By Pooya Stone

Mojtaba Zolnoor, a Member of the Iranian Parliament from the city of Qom and a hardliner figure close to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), was appointed as the president of Parliament’s National Security Commission.

Zolnoor had previously served as the Supreme Leader’s deputy representative in the IRGC. He was behind the crackdown on protesters in 2009, following popular uprisings that erupted in objection to the rigged results of the presidential elections.