Iran’s currency falls to a new low amid isolation and sanctions

• Iran’s troubled currency fell to a record low against the US dollar.
• The EU-Tehran relationship has deteriorated in recent months.
• The EU is debating a fourth round of sanctions against Iran.

Tehran: Iran‘s troubled currency fell to a record low against the US dollar on Saturday, as the country’s isolation grew and Europe Union sanctions against Tehran’s Revolutionary Guards or some of its members were considered.

The EU-Tehran relationship has deteriorated in recent months as efforts to restart nuclear talks have stalled. Iran has detained several European nationals, and the EU has grown increasingly critical of the country’s violent treatment of protesters, including the use of executions.

The EU is debating a fourth round of sanctions against Iran, and diplomatic sources say Revolutionary Guards members will be added to the bloc’s sanctions list next week. However, some EU member states want to go even further and label the Guards as a terrorist organization as a whole.

According to the foreign exchange site Bonbast.com, the dollar was selling for as much as 447,000 rials on Iran’s unofficial market on Saturday, up from 430,500 the previous day.

Since the death in police custody of a 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini, on Sept. 16, the rial has lost 29% of its value.

The unrest has posed one of the most serious challenges to Iran’s theocratic rule since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The economic Ecoiran website blamed the rials continued decline on a “global consensus” against Iran.

“Increasing political pressures, such as listing the Revolutionary Guards as terrorist organizations and imposing restrictions on Iran-linked ships and oil tankers… are indicators of a global consensus against Iran, (which may affect) the dollar’s rate in Tehran,” Ecoiran said.

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