US hits prominent Turkish biz executive with Iranian oil sanctions

The Biden administration is imposing sanctions on a prominent Turkish businessman reportedly close to Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for violations of US restrictions on the sales of Iranian oil.

The Treasury Department announced Thursday it was penalizing Sitki Ayan and a number of companies he and his family and associates control for facilitating the sale of hundreds of millions of dollars of Iranian oil for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.

Ayan and his firms have also laundered the proceeds of those sales for both the Guard and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement, both of which are designated as foreign terrorist organizations by the US, Treasury said.