The U.S. Treasury Department on Wednesday blacklisted two Dubai-based businesses it says are providing foreign currency exchange services to sanctioned Iranian banks. When making the announcement it also noted that any foreign banks that ignore these sanctions could find themselves cut off from the U.S. financial system as well. The action by Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), which administers the U.S. sanctions program, targeted Al Hilal Exchange and Al Fida International General Trading. Bank Mellat, which OFAC previously blacklisted because of its ties to Iran's nuclear program, used Al Fida General Trading as a front to hide the source of large sums of foreign currency exchanged at Al Hilal, Treasury said. For instance, during a three-month period last year, Bank Mellat reportedly exchanged more than $55 million at Al Hilal. The goal ostensibly was to hide the transactions from regulators in the United Arab Emirates. Nonetheless, earlier this month the UAE's
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