The United States government has significantly expanded its economic warfare campaign against the Iranian regime, targeting global networks that assist Tehran in acquiring advanced weaponry. On Wednesday, June 10, 2026, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced fresh, sweeping sanctions against 11 individuals and entities based primarily in China and Hong Kong. According to official government statements, these designated parties facilitated weapons procurement and managed illicit financial transactions on behalf of Iran’s military. This massive economic crackdown aims to completely isolate Tehran’s defense industrial base and disrupt the foreign supply chains feeding its ongoing war efforts.
The latest round of blacklistings represents a key pillar of the Trump administration’s overarching “Economic Fury” campaign, which aims to deliver maximum pressure on the Iranian regime. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that the Treasury Department is actively disrupting the foreign procurement networks that support the Iranian military’s efforts to acquire weapons. Bessent emphasized that the ongoing economic pressure campaign, which has already frozen over $1 billion in Iranian-linked financial assets, has severely disrupted the regime’s economy and dismantled the Iranian war machine. He declared that Washington will not tolerate any international support, whether direct or indirect, for the Iranian military.
The Treasury Department’s new sanctions specifically target a sophisticated procurement network operating out of East Asia on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). At the center of this network lies Mustad Limited, a Hong Kong-registered company that has facilitated or attempted to facilitate financial transactions to procure millions of dollars’ worth of weapons for the IRGC. The U.S. government designated Chinese national Liu Boyu, who serves as the sole director and president of Mustad Limited. In addition, regulators blacklisted Chinese nationals Wang Hongyi and Xu Lichun, who are both employees of Mustad, for actively working to procure weapons on behalf of the IRGC.
The sanctions also hit the corporate infrastructure supporting Mustad’s operations. OFAC blacklisted Mustad Shanghai International Trade Co Ltd, a Shanghai-based company wholly owned by Mustad Limited. Furthermore, the Treasury Department targeted Domus Trading HK Limited, a Hong Kong-based company that operates within Iran’s clandestine banking network. Treasury officials alleged that Domus Trading operates within this shadow financial system to facilitate covert payments on behalf of blocked Iranian entities, including transactions that support weapons procurement. Experts estimate that these clandestine financial networks managed transactions representing roughly 1.5% of the total illicit trade passing through East Asia.
Additionally, the U.S. government imposed strict financial penalties on key individual middlemen who helped coordinate these global supply lines. Regulators blacklisted Manuchehr Golchin, an Iranian national based in China, for allegedly facilitating weapons purchases and raw material sourcing for the Iranian military. By targeting both the corporate shells and the actual human intermediaries running these operations, Washington hopes to permanently disrupt the logistical continuity required to manage high-value weapons contracts. The sanctions immediately block all property and interests in property of these designated individuals and entities within the United States or in the possession of U.S. persons.
This latest economic barrage builds directly on previous rounds of sanctions designed to starve the Iranian military-industrial complex of essential manufacturing materials. On May 8, 2026, the U.S. government targeted ten individuals and companies based in the Middle East, Asia, and Eastern Europe. Those previous designations aimed to disrupt the procurement networks that sourced weapons for the IRGC and acquired raw materials for Iran’s Shahed-series unmanned aerial vehicles and ballistic missile programs. This rapid succession of sanctions proves that Washington intends to continuously tighten its economic blockade, preventing Tehran from reconstituting its weapons production capacity.
The announcement of the new sanctions coincided with a major escalation of physical military strikes in the Middle East. On Wednesday, U.S. Central Command confirmed that American forces launched a fresh wave of airstrikes against Iranian air defense positions and surveillance radars near the Strait of Hormuz. The strikes followed a dangerous escalation where Iran and Israel exchanged direct ballistic missile attacks over the weekend. President Donald Trump warned that the U.S. military will continue to hit Iranian targets hard, while simultaneously announcing that American forces have been taking millions of barrels of oil out of the Islamic Republic nightly to degrade its economic power.
As the U.S. Treasury Department aggressively advances its Economic Fury campaign, the geopolitical standoff in the Middle East has entered an incredibly volatile phase. By systematically blacklisting Chinese and Hong Kong entities, the United States is warning global businesses that they must choose between trading with the American market or supporting the Iranian military. While Beijing has previously criticized these measures as long-arm jurisdiction, the threat of secondary sanctions on foreign financial institutions will likely force many global banks to comply. Until Washington and Tehran can find a way to establish genuine trust and negotiate a permanent treaty, this aggressive combination of military strikes and severe economic penalties will continue to dominate the region.
