Young man shot dead by Iran’s Basij during war with Israel – student outlet

The Washington-based group told Iran International that the executions this month included 38 for drug-related offenses, 26 for murder, seven on political charges and one for a sexual crime.

“What is going on behind the closed doors of Iran’s prisons, summary and arbitrary executions whose details are deliberately hidden from the public, is nothing short of mass killing,” Roya Boroumand, the center’s executive director told Iran International.

“These are not acts of justice or crime prevention but the desperate violence of a state that has lost the consent of its people,” she added.

Rights groups, including Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights, have documented that executions in Iran disproportionately affect members of ethnic minorities.

Of the seven people executed on political charges this month, six were from the Arab minority and one from the Kurdish minority.

In late September, Amnesty International said that in less than nine months, the number of people executed by Iranian authorities this year has already surpassed last year’s total of 972, marking the highest annual figure recorded by the group in at least 15 years.

Last week, Mai Sato, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, said 11 people have been executed on alleged espionage charges this year, with nine carried out after Israel’s military strikes on Iran on June 13.

The surge in executions comes as Iran’s Guardian Council approved a new espionage law expanding the definition of spying and increasing penalties, including the death sentence, for cooperation with foreign governments or media deemed hostile.

Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf formally notified President Masoud Pezeshkian of the legislation earlier this week, marking its final approval and paving the way for it to take effect, raising concerns over a further expansion of the death penalty and a potential rise in executions under the new law.

“The Treasury Department is degrading Iran’s cash flow by dismantling key elements of Iran’s energy export machine,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said.

“Under President Trump, this administration is disrupting the regime’s ability to fund terrorist groups that threaten the United States.”

The latest measures mark the fourth round of sanctions under the US President Donald Trump’s administration targeting China-based refineries that continue to buy Iranian oil, the Treasury said.

"Iran was about one month, maybe two months, away from having a nuclear weapon. And if I allowed that to happen, this deal would not have been possible," Trump told Fox News in a phone interview on Wednesday evening.

"It's a very much different Iran. And frankly, we've had some very good conversations. And as you saw, they blessed the deal. They put out a few hours ago a statement that they agree with the deal, and they blessed the deal," he added, without elaborating. "That's a tremendous thing."

Tehran had not published any official reaction to the announcement by the United States, Hamas and Israel that the parties had agreed to the release of hostages held in Gaza in exchange for a partial pullback of Israeli forces and the freeing of Palestinian political prisoners.

US planes and submarine-launched missiles attacked three key Iranian nuclear sites on June 22, capping off a surprise Israeli military campaign against the Islamic Republic which battered its arch-foe.

Tehran denies seeking a nuclear weapon, called the attacks illegal and has vowed to resist what it calls Israeli aggression. Still, officials have long said they would support any peace deal agreed by Palestinians.

Iran has backed Palestinian militants and armed affiliates throughout the Middle East it calls a "Resistance Axis" opposed to Israel and the United States.

"I believe if they had a nuclear weapon, there would be a whole different even if we made the deal, it would have, literally, a very dark cloud over it because of what could potentially happen," Trump added.

"And by the way, I believe Iran is going to be actually a part of the whole peace situation," he added.

The investigation, led by research firm Kharon and backed by a US civil forfeiture case, reveals how the network used intermediaries across Europe, the Middle East and the Americas to conceal its Iranian military end-users.

“With its use of layered intermediaries, third-country brokers and seemingly legitimate front companies in Western Europe, the helicopter-parts network demonstrates the growing sophistication of the illicit supply chains that support sanctioned military programs,” Kharon said.

The US Treasury’s October 1 sanctions followed the UN’s snapback on Iranian restrictions and targeted the Iran-based Pasargad Parvaz Kish Helicopter Company (PHC) and its Germany-based chief executive, Mehdi Shirazi Shayesteh. Treasury said PHC procured aircraft and spare parts for Iran’s state helicopter maker, PANHA, using a “transnational procurement network.”

Corporate filings show that PHC’s ownership ties extend into the investment arm of the sanctioned Pasargad Bank, embedding it within Iran’s restricted financial system.

According to a civil forfeiture complaint reviewed by Kharon, Shayesteh and his Iran-based partner, Amirhossein Salimi—the head of Uruguay’s Perfect Day SA—set up a joint venture in Portugal in 2021 called Business United Unipessoal LDA. Their first deal was the acquisition of a US-origin helicopter, which was routed through the network and eventually sold to PHC.

A US link in the chain

Among the entities linked to the operation was Cobra International, a Union City, New Jersey–based supplier that advertises itself as serving “civilian and military markets.” Between 2021 and 2023, Business United carried out several transactions with Cobra, including a $209,000 purchase of a used helicopter engine that US authorities later seized.

Kharon’s review found Cobra’s business connections also reached companies tied to Russia’s defense sector.

Court filings identified Dubai-based Indian broker Krishnamurthy Shekar as a key facilitator who sought helicopter engines from Cobra in 2023 on behalf of Business United. He maintains professional links to several aviation suppliers in the UAE and India.

In Europe, Swedish national Ramtin Emami directed two companies—Nordic Air and Heli Invest AB—that received US-origin parts from Cobra and re-exported them to Iran. Business United requested that the shipments be routed through Sweden before their final delivery to PHC, according to Kharon’s findings.

The case underscores the growing complexity of Iran’s defense procurement networks, which rely on Western intermediaries, layered brokers and front companies to mask their military objectives.

The Commerce Department included two subsidiaries of US-based chip distributor Arrow Electronics Inc. on its so-called entity list for allegedly facilitating purchases of American technology by Iran-linked groups. It is unusual for units of a US-listed company to appear on the blacklist.

Arrow spokesperson John Hourigan said the subsidiaries in China and Hong Kong “have been operating in full compliance with US export control regulations” and the company was discussing the matter with the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).

In all, BIS added 26 entities and three addresses to the list of firms that US vendors cannot sell to without government approval. US suppliers should presume requests will be denied on national security grounds, the agency said.

Some of the new listings stemmed from wreckage of drones recovered by Persian Gulf states and Israel, which investigators found contained US-origin components routed through the sanctioned firms. BIS said parts recovered from Hamas drones used in the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel also traced back to some of the companies.

Part of wider campaign

The action is the latest in a series of measures aimed at constraining Iran’s weapons programs and its use of front companies abroad. Earlier this month, the Treasury Department imposed sanctions on 38 people and entities from Iran and China accused of advancing Tehran’s procurement of surface-to-air missiles and US-made helicopter parts. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Washington would “deny the regime weapons it would use to further its malign objectives.”

Those sanctions were also tied to the reimposition of United Nations measures on Iran under the “snapback” mechanism triggered by Britain, France and Germany in late September. The restored restrictions cover Iran’s nuclear, missile and arms programs, along with embargoes, travel bans and asset freezes.

Targeting financial networks

The US has also sought to cut off the flow of money to Iran’s armed forces and aligned groups. In September, the Treasury sanctioned four Iranian nationals and more than a dozen companies in the UAE and Hong Kong accused of moving hundreds of millions of dollars through oil sales and cryptocurrency transactions. Officials said the networks helped finance ballistic missile and drone programs, as well as groups such as Hezbollah.

The same week, the State Department revoked a sanctions waiver for Iran’s Chabahar Port that had been in place since 2018 to support reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, warning that firms operating there could face penalties.