The United States has imposed sanctions on members of an international oil smuggling network whose leaders it says have provided support to Iran's Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force.

The US Treasury said in a statement - today, Friday - that it imposed sanctions on a person believed to be smuggling oil, and companies that provide support to the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.

The ministry added that the ministry's Office of Foreign Assets Control targeted Mahmoud Rashid Al-Habsi and a network of companies, two of which are in Oman, one in Liberia and one in Romania.

The decision means freezing any assets belonging to individuals and entities on the blacklist in the United States and prohibiting Americans from dealing with them.

In turn, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said in a statement that "the sanctions target an oil broker from Oman, who has used several companies to facilitate shipments of Iranian oil to foreign customers."

He added that the Revolutionary Guard uses the proceeds of Iranian oil sales to fund what it described as its malign activities.

Blinken explained that these sales depend on foreign intermediaries to hide the involvement of the Revolutionary Guards, and that the United States will continue to expose and disrupt those who support these efforts, as he put it.

This step comes as efforts aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran have stalled, and Washington's impatience towards delaying Tehran's return to indirect talks with US officials in Vienna.

A US official said last month that Washington was considering a crackdown on Iranian oil sales to China that have continued despite the sanctions.

It is noteworthy that the United States, under former President Donald Trump, withdrew from the nuclear agreement with Iran in May 2018, and in August of the same year, imposed sanctions on Tehran to push it to sign a new agreement and limit its regional influence.