US slaps sanctions on Syrian employees

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Monday imposed sanctions on 271 employees of the Syrian government agency it said was responsible for producing chemical weapons and ballistic missiles, an effort to impose a sweeping punishment after a sarin attack on civilians this month.

The sanctions on members of President Bashar Assad’s Scientific Studies and Research Center more than double the number of Syrian individuals and entities whose property has been blocked by the United States and who are barred from financial transactions with American people or companies.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, describing the action by his department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, said it seeks to punish those behind this month’s chemical weapons attack in Khan Sheikhoun and previous ones carried out by Assad’s government, and to deter others contemplating similar actions.

It is not clear what impact the restrictions will have, however, given that they only apply to business, financial holdings or transactions involving people or companies in the United States. Administration officials said the sanctions are focused on highly educated Syrian officials with expertise in chemistry who are thought to have the ability to possibly use the American financial system.

In January, the Treasury Department blacklisted 18 Syrians, including six connected to the scientific studies center, after the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the international body that polices chemical weapons, determined that the government had been responsible for three chlorine-gas attacks.

The Syrian government has portrayed the Scientific Studies and Research Center as a medical and agricultural study agency, but the U.S. considers it a training ground and secret laboratory network for engineers developing chemical and biological weapons.