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Sanctions and sovereignty clash
Iran denounced impending United States sanctions as a “complete erosion of sovereignty” after US President Donald Trump threatened to punish any country doing business with Tehran.
“an assertion of extraterritorial sovereignty”
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said the US announcement was “an assertion of extraterritorial sovereignty” against the United Nations’ member states.
Baghaei argued that “No State can compel foreign banks, enterprises or airports to renounce commerce with Iran,” framing the US move as an attack on the UN-based inter-State system.
The dispute unfolded as Trump said the US was “seeing what happens” in the conflict, while the US Navy maintained its blockade against Iran’s ports and oil shipment traffic through the Strait of Hormuz had “virtually ceased.”
In parallel, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on X that the new measures were “bound to fail,” adding “We have seen this movie before. The same bull. Different bullies.”
US pressure campaign and threats
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC that Washington would “collapse” Iran’s regime, urging allies to support efforts to “squash” the Iranian economy.
Bessent said the planned pressure campaign would be the “greatest co-ordinated economic isolation in the history of the world,” and warned that if partners kept doing business with Tehran, “the US Treasury and the US government will put [their] full might and force towards enforcing against you.”
The BBC reported that the US and Israel started a war with Iran in February, and that Iran has largely closed the Strait of Hormuz, with ceasefires in April and June aimed at facilitating negotiations that later broke down.
Bessent also said the new economic penalties would minimise the need for a “large-scale kinetic restart,” while Trump prepared what he called the “most crushing economic operation ever taken against any country.”
Iranian officials and media framed the US campaign as coercion rather than diplomacy, with the Iranian Foreign Ministry calling the sanctions “economic terrorism” and “crimes against humanity” in a statement issued on Thursday.
Shipping, retaliation, and stakes
As the US prepared to announce tougher sanctions, Iran warned of a “devastating” response to any new threats, with Major General Ali Abdollahi saying Iran’s armed forces would respond with “crushing, punishing and devastating responses.”
“crushing, punishing and devastating responses”
Kpler data cited by Marine Insight showed only seven commodity ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Aug. 20, compared with more than 130 a day before the war, and the Strait carried about one-fifth of all traded oil before February.
The same reporting said the US and Iran announced ceasefire agreements twice, in April and June, both aimed at restoring shipping through Hormuz, but both agreements later broke down.
Iran’s parliament speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf said, “We must make plans to deal with the unjust sanctions so that we can overcome them,” while also accusing the United States and Israel of using economic and “cognitive” warfare against Iran.
The Hill reported that Bessent described the strategy as “a one-two punch” combining the blockade with “the toughest sanctions in history,” as Iran’s Foreign Affairs Ministry responded that the measures amount to “economic terrorism.”