US targets UAE-based Indian in latest Iranian sanctions

The Trump administration’s so-called maximum pressure on Iran has turned its attention to Jugwinder Singh Brar, an Indian national based in the United Arab Emirates, who owns the companies Prime Tankers and Glory International.

The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has sanctioned Brar, saying he owns a fleet of nearly 30 vessels, mainly handysize product tankers, many of which operate as part of Iran’s shadow fleet.

OFAC also designated two UAE- and two India-based entities that own and operate Brar’s vessels that have transported Iranian oil on behalf of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) and the Iranian military.

“The Iranian regime relies on its network of unscrupulous shippers and brokers like Brar and his companies to enable its oil sales and finance its destabilising activities,” said secretary of the treasury Scott Bessent. “The United States remains focused on disrupting all elements of Iran’s oil exports, particularly those who seek to profit from this trade.”

In his first term, Trump withdrew the US from the Iran nuclear deal and reimposed a full embargo on Iran’s crude oil exports in 2019. As a result, Iran’s crude oil shipments collapsed from 2.5m barrels per day in the first half of 2018 to 250,000 barrels per day.

During the Biden administration, sanctions were not as strictly enforced, and Iranian exports gradually recovered. In the opening months of Trump’s return to power, there have been many new sanctions packages aimed at Iran’s shadow fleet as well as Iran’s ties to the Houthis in Yemen.