New Zealand slaps 40 Iran officials with sanctions over protest crackdown

New Zealand on Wednesday imposed sanctions on dozens of Iranian ministers and officials over their alleged role in the violent crackdown launched last month by Iranian authorities against anti-regime protests.

What happened: The sanctions include travel bans on 40 officials allegedly responsible for human rights abuses in Iran, including Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni, Intelligence Minister Esmail Khatib, Prosecutor-General Mohammad Movahedi-Azad, as well as members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters announced in a press release.

“It has been horrifying to witness the brutal killing of thousands of protesters in Iran,” Peters said. “Iranians have the right to peaceful protest, freedom of expression, and access to information. Those rights have been ruthlessly violated.”

The travel ban also targets three Iranian individuals believed to be involved in Iran’s “malign activity abroad.”

“Iran’s destabilizing activities are totally outside the norms of acceptable state behavior,” Peters added. “New Zealand will continue to act deliberately and alongside partners when we see actions that undermine international law and regional stability."

The Iranian Embassy in New Zealand responded quickly to Peters’ announcement, saying the move to impose travel bans was “politically motivated” and “based on misinformation.”

“Over the past two decades, a number of Western states have supported and enforced unlawful and coercive sanctions led by the United States against the Iranian people,” the embassy said in a statement. “These inhumane measures have directly affected the fundamental rights of ordinary Iranians.”

While the embassy reiterated the Iranian people’s right to peaceful assembly, it accused foreign actors, including the US and Israel, of instigating chaos and violence during last month’s protests.

Background: New Zealand is the latest country to impose sanctions on officials in Iran following the wave of violence that authorities unleashed against the protesters.

Australia took similar measures earlier this month, placing 20 individuals and three entities linked to the IRGC on its sanctions list over what the Australian government said was their role in the repression of the Iranian people and involvement in Iran’s nuclear and missile programs.

On Jan. 29, the European Union designated the IRGC as a terrorist organization and adopted another package of sanctions against 21 state entities and Iranian officials.

“Repression cannot go unanswered,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas wrote on X in announcing the decision. “Any regime that kills thousands of its own people is working toward its own demise.”

Meanwhile, the US Treasury Department has announced several rounds of sanctions against senior Iranian officials and financial networks since January as part of its ongoing pressure campaign against Tehran.

The latest New Zealand move marks the fourth tranche of travel bans Wellington has imposed on Iranian officials over alleged human rights violations since 2022. The newly sanctioned 40 individuals join a list of 55 Iranian ministers, military figures and members who were already subject to travel bans. The measures were introduced in three earlier rounds — in December 2022, February 2023 and June 2023 — in response to another wave of violence by Iranian authorities against nationwide protests that erupted after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in September 2022.

Some of the targeted individuals were also accused of supplying drones to Russia for use in the war in Ukraine.

“Today’s actions send a clear message that those who act with callous disregard for human life are not welcome here,” Peters said in the same press release.

A wave of protests erupted in Iran on Dec. 28, 2025, and continued into early January, initially triggered by a sharp plunge in the national currency. The protest movement quickly expanded to include calls for the end of the Islamic regime.

Iranian authorities responded to the protests with a violent crackdown that killed more than 7,000 protesters. More than 53,777 others were arrested, according to figures published by the US-based HRANA rights group on Monday.

Know more: On Saturday, as universities across Iran reopened for the new academic semester after nearly two weeks of closure, large groups of students at major campuses staged rallies in the latest sign of renewed anti-regime protests. The gatherings have since continued, entering their fifth consecutive day on Wednesday.

Videos circulating online showed demonstrators chanting slogans against the Iranian regime and burning the flag of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

In other instances, students at Pars University of Architecture and Art in Tehran were heard shouting “Long live the Shah,” while masses at Tehran’s University of Art raised the pre-1979 Lion and Sun flag.