NYT : U.S. Levels Sanctions Against Iran Military Unit

U.S. Levels Sanctions Against Iran Military Unit

By HELENE COOPER and JOHN H. CUSHMAN Jr. | October 25, 2007

WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — The Bush administration announced a long-debated policy of new sanctions against Iran today, accusing the elite Quds division of the Revolutionary Guard Corps of supporting terrorism.

The administration also accused the entire Revolutionary Guard Corps, a part of Iran’s military, of proliferating weapons of mass destruction. While the United States has long labeled Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism, the decision to single out the Guard reflects increased frustration in the administration with the slow pace of diplomatic negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear program.

The designations put into play unilateral sanctions intended to impede the Revolutionary Guard and those who do business with it. This is the first time that the United States has taken such steps against the armed forces of any sovereign government.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson announced the new sanctions at a State Department news conference.

Ms. Rice said the measures were intended “to confront the threatening behavior of the Iranians.” As the Bush administration has many times before, the secretary drew a distinction between the Iran government and the country’s people. “We in the United States have no conflict with you,” she said.

While Washington is open to a diplomatic solution, Ms. Rice said, “Unfortunately the Iranian government continues to spurn our offer of open negotiations, instead threatening peace and security by pursuing nuclear technologies that can lead to a nuclear weapon, building dangerous ballistic missiles, supporting Shia militants in Iraq and terrorists in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, and denying the existence of a fellow member of the United Nations, threatening to wipe Israel off the map.”

Mr. Paulson said that, in dealing with Iran, “it is nearly impossible to know one’s customer and be assured that one is not unwittingly facilitating the regime’s reckless behavior and conduct.”

“It is increasingly likely that if you are doing business with Iran you are doing business” with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps,” Mr. Paulson said.

The announcement also intensifies the strained relations between the two countries. The administration has accused Revolutionary Guard members of providing weaponry and explosive devices used by Shiite militias against American troops in Iraq — a charge that Tehran has denied.

In August, White House officials said they intended to declare the entire Revolutionary Guard a foreign terrorist organization, but reports of such a move so raised the hackles of America’s European allies and some officials in the State and Treasury Departments that the administration put those plans on hold while the internal debate continued. The announcement today reflects a compromise.

Senators Joseph I. Lieberman, an independent Democrat from Connecticut, and Jon Kyl, Republican of Arizona, immediately applauded the move. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps “has long had blood on its hands, most recently in supporting terrorist actions against our troops in Iraq,” they said in a joint statement.

“Far from taking us closer to war with Iran, as some have irresponsibly suggested, these kinds of targeted sanctions represent our best chance to influence Iran’s action so as to be able to avoid military action,” they said.

In the internal debate over American policy toward Iran, Ms. Rice has been struggling for more than a year to hold together a fragile coalition of world powers that have been trying to rein in Iran’s nuclear ambitions through what was supposed to be a gradually escalating series of United Nations sanctions. But after two rounds of sanctions, Russia and Chinahave balked at escalation to another round.

Last week Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, caused consternation in the administration when he visited Tehran and said publicly that there was no need for military strikes. The guard and its military wing are identified as a power base for Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Under his administration, American officials said, the Guard has moved increasingly into commercial operations, earning profits and extending its influence in Iran in areas involving big government contracts, including building airports and other infrastructure, producing oil and providing cellphones.

The immediate legal consequence of designating the Quds unit as a terrorist organization will make it unlawful for anyone subject to United States jurisdiction to knowingly provide material support or resources to it, according to the State Department. Any United States financial institution that becomes aware that it possesses, or has control over, funds of a foreign terrorist organization would have to turn them over to the Treasury Department.

Because Iran has done little business with the United States in more than two decades, the larger point of the designation would be to heighten the political and psychological pressure on Iran, administration officials said, by using the designation to persuade foreign governments and financial institutions to cut ties with Iranian businesses and individuals.

David Stout contributed reporting.