SYRIA: New US sanctions against individuals and entities supporting Syrian President al-Assad and his Baath Regime

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Treasury Department released a statement this week in which it announced the US has imposed new sanctions under the “Caesar Act” on a number of Syrian individuals and entities which support the regime. Newly listed under the “Caesar Law” are: the son of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad Hafez, Kiram al-Assad, Zuhair Tawfiq al-Assad, and businessman Wasim Anwar al-Qattan. Syrian military divisions were also sanctioned.

“While corrupt businessmen with ties to Assad invest in luxury real estate made possible by forced displacement of innocent civilians, they also worsen the oppression of the Syrian people,” said US Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin. “The United States remains committed to providing humanitarian assistance to the Syrian people, while the Assad regime seeks to profit from their suffering.”

White House spokeswoman Kylie McKinney confirmed during a press conference that “there will be new sanctions, and they will be part of the ongoing campaign of political and economic pressure aimed at depriving the government of Damascus of the resources it uses in the war against the Syrian people.”

The US Treasury Department this Tuesday also imposed sanctions on two people residing in Syria and Turkey, Farouk Hammoud and Adnan Muhammad Amin al-Rawi, after allegedly having provided financial facilities to the terrorist organization ISIS.

The Caesar Act was initially was intended to bring regime torturers to account but was finally adopted as a law to put maximum pressure on the Syrian Baath regime and its cronies.

Whether imposing sanctions on Bashar al-Assad his son will stop the civil war is to be questioned.