The government is facing mounting pressure to unveil tough new replacements for the Obama-era sanctions on Iran, many of which are due to expire in October.

UN curbs on the regime’s ballistic missile programme will be lifted, along with separate UK and EU measures targeting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Iran’s defence ministry, its weapons manufacturers and the universities working on its nuclear weapons programme.

Without urgent new UK and EU sanctions, Iran experts say, the regime will able to supply sophisticated missiles to other hostile states and terror groups and procure high-tech components to build and test new models.

Iran may also be flooded with billions of dollars of unfrozen funds, potentially bankrolling its worldwide network of proxy militias that target Israel and Jews.

The end of the current sanctions regime will be triggered by so-called “sunset clauses” built into the original 2015 deal aimed at restricting Iran’s nuclear programme, which was endorsed by UN Security Council resolution 2231.

Under its terms, both UN sanctions on Iran’s ballistic missiles and UK and EU measures targeting a long list of individuals, government bodies and weapons firms must end on October 18.

UN sanctions on the Iranian conventional weapons industry expired in 2020, since when Iran has sold suicide drones to Russia for use in Ukraine.

British diplomats are involved in negotiations with allies in the US and Europe on renewing the non-UN sanctions, the JC understands.

However, none of the undisclosed proposals have been signed off by Downing Street, and MPs have been left in the dark.

A Foreign Office spokesperson declined to comment. One former minister said that, on Iran, “right now, there is no plan”.

Source: The Jerusalem Chronicle