The EU plans to impose sanctions on three senior Iranian military commanders and the company that develops drones believed to have been used in Russia’s attacks on Ukraine.
The draft sanctions list, seen by the Guardian, is expected to be agreed within days, indicating EU ministers do not believe Iran’s denials that it has supplied Russia with the low-flying lethal weapons.
The proposals came as Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the European Commission, condemned Russia’s strikes on critical energy infrastructure as “acts of pure terror” that amounted to war crimes.
Ukrainian officials have said “kamikaze” drones targeted Kyiv on Monday, in attacks that killed four people, including a pregnant woman and her partner. Videos taken in the Ukrainian capital showed Iran’s Shahed drones, with their distinctive triangle shape, flying low over the city and then crashing into the ground, as terrified people fled.
GPS-guided Shahed 136 drones can fly up to 1,500 miles from trucks launched outside Ukraine and are believed to have been deployed across the country since August. Although they fly slowly, making them vulnerable to being shot down, their sheer numbers are proving a test for Ukraine’s air defences.
The EU sanctions are targeted at Shahed Aviation Industries, which EU officials say has links to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps’ aerospace force and is responsible for the design and development of the unmanned aerial vehicles.
The EU plans to target three senior military figures, including the chief of staff of Iran’s armed forces, Maj Gen Mohammad Hossein Bagheri, said by officials to play a fundamental role in Iran’s defence cooperation with Russia. Also listed is Gen Sayed Hojatollah Qureishi, who is in charge of supply and research at Iran’s defence ministry, and Brig Gen Saeed Aghajani, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps aerospace force UAV command. Qureishi is said to have been responsible for negotiating the supply agreement with Russia, while Aghajani is described by the EU listing as “the backbone of Iran’s unmanned aerial vehicles programme”.
The final list has still to be approved by senior EU diplomats from the 27 member states before it comes into force.
Largely symbolic, the sanctions ban the individuals from entering the EU and freeze any assets held in the bloc. Adding Iranian names to the EU’s existing Russia sanctions is a relatively straightforward step in comparison with measures targeting Iran’s economy, which is already subject to western trade embargos over Iran’s nuclear programme.
Iran has repeatedly denied supplying Russia with drones, putting Tehran at odds with Ukraine, western officials and many independent experts who say that Shahed 136 drones have been widely used in Russia’s attacks. An anonymous Iranian official told Reuters that Russia had asked for more Iranian drones and ballistic missiles with “improved accuracy” when senior officials from Tehran visited Moscow recently.
Lithuania’s foreign minister, Gabrielius Landsbergis, one of the EU’s most hawkish voices on sanctions, tweeted: “If Iran walks like a duck, talks like a duck and admits to supplying drones to the biggest duck in the world then I think we have enough evidence to say that Iran is a duck. Let’s sanction the duck out of them.”
The latest response to Iran comes after the EU slapped sanctions on 11 Iranian officials and four entities believed to be responsible for the violent crackdown on peaceful protesters demonstrating against the regime, after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in custody.
In further condemnation of Russia, meanwhile, Von der Leyen said: “Yesterday we saw again Russia’s targeted attacks against civilian infrastructure. This is marking another chapter in an already very cruel war. The international order is very clear. These are war crimes.
“Targeted attacks on civilian infrastructure with the clear aim to cut off men, women, children of water, electricity and heating with the winter coming, these are acts of pure terror and we have to call it as such.”
