U.S. prepares for more sanctions on Iran oil deals

The U.S. government officially linked Iran's state oil company to the country's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Monday, a determination that enables Washington to apply new sanctions on foreign banks dealing with the company, Reuters reports.

The Treasury Department determined that the National Iranian Oil Company, one of the world's largest oil exporters, is "an agent or affiliate" of the IRGC, which the United States has long put under sanctions for terrorism and human rights abuses.

The U.S. Congress directed Treasury to determine whether Iran's oil and tanker companies were linked to the IRGC as part of a new package of sanctions signed into law in August.

Adam Szubin, the head of Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, told Congress in a letter that the IRGC's influence has grown in the oil company, a petroleum and natural gas producer based in Tehran, and throughout Iran's energy sector.

Iran's elite guard force has recently been coordinating a campaign to sell Iranian oil in an effort to evade Western sanctions, specifically the EU's Iranian oil embargo that went into force in July, the Treasury Department said.