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Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21423715/
Fresh Ways of Turning the Economic Screws on Iran
[Financial Times-UK/MSNBC] Daniel Dombey and Stephanie Kirchgaessner - The U.S. is fizzing with ideas about how to push Iran in the dispute over its nuclear program. Secretary of State Rice has signalled that the U.S. may put the Quds Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard on the U.S.'s terrorist list. The U.S. Treasury has banned two Iranian banks from accessing dollar financing, and discouraged international banks from doing business with Tehran. The combination of executive orders that prohibit third parties from doing business in the U.S. on behalf of the Iranian banks Saderat and Sepah, together with a UN resolution proscribing Sepah, has helped deter many international financial institutions from transactions with Iran. The U.S. has been considering issuing an order against a third Iranian bank, Bank Melli, and has also looked at extending measures against the country's central bank. Swift, the international financial messaging group, has made it obligatory to identify any underlying benefactor in bank-to-bank payments. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives has passed a bill that could force President Bush to impose sanctions on foreign energy groups that invest in Iran. At least three U.S. states have also passed legislation that requires or calls for divestment from companies that have invested in Iran's energy sector.