WANA (Sep 15) – The U.S. Treasury Department on Monday announced sanctions against Russia’s VTB Bank over its alleged role in helping Iran circumvent sanctions.

 

The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said in a statement that the Russian bank was targeted over what Washington described as assistance to Iran in evading U.S. sanctions.

 

VTB is one of Russia’s largest banks and has previously been targeted by the United States and other Western countries under various sanctions regimes.

 

The move comes as Washington continues to rely on economic sanctions and financial pressure against Iran, with the latest measures adding to its broader campaign of restrictions on financial networks linked to Tehran.

 

However, Dani Citrinowicz, a former head of the Iran branch at Israeli military intelligence, has previously warned about the effectiveness of such a strategy. In a post on X, he said that if Washington continues to believe that sufficient economic pressure will eventually force Iran to surrender, that approach would reflect “a fundamental failure to understand the enemy.”

 

Citrinowicz argued that continued reliance on economic pressure may not produce the outcome Washington seeks if it fails to take Iran’s behavior and strategic calculations into account.