U.S. sanctions against Iran ripped after quake

Americans with family can’t send cash to help

KERMANSHAH, Iran — With Iranian-americans abroad unable to send money directly to Iran to aid those affected by this week’s powerful earthquake that killed over 530 people, criticism of U.S. sanctions on Iran flared up anew on Thursday.

The 2015 nuclear deal Tehran struck with world powers lifted some sanctions but others, dating back as far as the days after the 1979 U.S. Embassy takeover, still stand, including those that prohibit about 1 million Iranian-americans from directly sending cash to Iran.

The state-run IRNA news agency, as well as other media, published articles criticizing the rules.

“Despite all the difficulties, Iranians living in the U.S. are doing their best to devise innovative solutions to send their humanitarian supplies to the quake-hit areas in western Iran,” IRNA’S report said.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said earlier this week that his country does not need foreign help for the quake and it is capable of managing the aftermath on its own.

President Donald Trump has not commented on the earthquake so far. He has refused to re-certify the Iran nuclear deal, sending it to Congress instead, and has accused Iran of arming Shiite rebels in Yemen with ballistic missiles to attack Saudi Arabia.

The U.S. Treasury has lifted some sanctions in the past to help with Iranian earthquake relief, most notably in 2003 under the administration of President George W. Bush when a magnitude 6.6 earthquake killed 26,000 people in Bam. That was even after Bush named Iran a member of the “axis of evil.”

In a statement to The Associated Press, the Treasury called the earthquake “tragic” and said it allows donations of food, clothing and medicine to previously approved American organizations, which then send them on to Iran. Those organizations also can send up to $500,000 a year in cash, the Treasury said.

However, the Treasury did not respond to questions whether it would lift sanctions as in 2003.

Without that, banks and other organizations will remain fearful of running afoul of U.S. laws, which “tend to be fuzzy, and the fines … seem to be astronomical,” said Trita Parsi, the founder and president of the National Iranian American Council.

A bank once told “us the best way to send money to Iran is to fill a suitcase with cash and fly to Tehran,” Parsi told the AP.