In an in-depth investigation, energy and foreign policy experts explained how the Chinese Communist Party and Chinese entities are likely to be “indirectly bankrolling terrorist proxies of the Iranian regime” to the Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF). Data intelligence firm Kpler noted in August that China was purchasing roughly 1.5 million barrels per day of sanctioned Iranian oil.
Since the Biden administration came to power in 2021, Iran’s oil revenues jumped by approximately 1 million barrels per day. “United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) estimates that Iran has generated around $80 billion in revenue from oil sales defying U.S. sanctions under the Biden administration because of lax enforcement” Jason Brodsky, UANI’s policy director told the DCNF.
In violation of the sanctions, Iran received huge revenues from China which then went toward funding Tehran’s network of terrorist proxy groups across the Middle East, including Hamas. The result comes directly from “a policy choice by the Biden administration…inevitably, this resources Tehran’s proxies and partners, and therefore China helps fund this aggression” added Brodsky.
The main appeal to Chinese businesses for importing Iranian oil is that it is selling at a discount because of the sanctions against it, according to Bloomberg. This appeal is only made stronger by elevated oil prices worldwide.
The DCNF writes, “the Iranian government interacts with its terrorist proxies through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which is itself a State Department-designated terrorist organization.”
“The facts are indisputable, China is the principal customer of Iranian oil. It’s in contravention to sanctions we are enforcing,” Robert Greenway, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Center for National Defense and an architect of the Trump administration’s Iran sanctions while serving as the senior director of the National Security Council’s Middle Eastern and North African Affairs Directorate, told the DCNF.
“I have studied the IRGC people for 35 years, I have fought them, I have seen every bit of U.S. intelligence produced over the last 35 years pertaining to them—I can tell you that the IRGC benefits directly from oil sales in about ten different ways.”