In the first session of the new Congress, U.S. Republican Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL), Todd Young (R-IN) and John Cornyn (R-TX) reintroduced the Iran Non-nuclear Sanctions Act, a legislation that would impose harsh financial and economic sanctions countering Iran’s non-nuclear activities.

The hawkish GOP senators, who had introduced the same bill last December, slammed the Obama administration for not adopting adequate measures against Iran.

“I look forward to working with the new administration to hold Iran fully accountable for both its nonnuclear and nuclear threats,” Rubio said during the session, his official website reported on Tuesday.

“This legislation would impose real consequences on Iran,” said Young.

“It’s time Congress and our new President impose real economic consequences for Iran’s actions,” Cornyn said.

The bill comes despite the fact that under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), struck between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., UK, France, Russia, and China, plus Germany) in 2015, no further sanctions are to be imposed on Iran since the Implementation Day of the deal (January 16, 2016).

The Iran Non-Nuclear Sanctions Act would:

* Impose new sanctions against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Mahan Air;

* Create a new Treasury Department watch list for entities in which the IRGC has an ownership interest of less than 25 percent;

* Expand current sanctions and imposes new sanctions against Iran on human rights grounds, while also mandating full transparency to Congress on all American citizens detained by Iran and U.S. government efforts to free them;

* Impose new sanctions against persons that knowingly aid Iran’s ballistic missile program;

* Mandate new sanctions against entities owned 25 percent or greater or controlled by Iran’s key ballistic missile organizations, including the Aerospace Industries Organization, the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group, or the Shahid Bakeri Industrial Group;

* Require a presidential certification that persons listed in UN Security Council Resolutions are not engaged in activities related to ballistic missiles and requires the imposition of sanctions if that certification cannot be made;

* Impose sanctions on persons involved in sectors of Iran’s economy that support, directly or indirectly, Iran’s ballistic program; and

* Codify current prohibitions against Iran’s direct and indirect access to the U.S. financial system, while also streamlining and strengthening the requirements for the president to remove Iran or any other country from what the U.S. calls the state sponsors of terrorism list.

SP/PA