US gives Iran's airlines until 23 September. Such deadlines nearly always stuck.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on 21 September that all Iranian airlines will be shut out of world travel from Wednesday 23 September.
What happened
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC on that all Iranian airlines would be shut down around the world on , and warned that foreign airports, fuel suppliers and ticket sellers that keep serving them risk losing access to the dollar system.
The cut-off comes at 12.01am Eastern time on , when a US licence called Iran General License DD ends. It lets firms finish old deals with Iranian airlines under US permissions that are now suspended. Nothing more has to be signed for the cut-off to happen. Only a new licence from OFAC, the US Treasury’s sanctions office, would stop it.
Both documents are already in the Federal Register, the official US record of rules, at 91 FR 57511 and 91 FR 57795. There is no Commerce Department rule and no decision by ICAO, the UN body for world aviation, in this action.
On OFAC sanctioned 27 Iranian airlines under Executive Order 13902. It also sanctioned firms in the UAE, Türkiye, the UK, Malaysia and Kazakhstan that help Mahan Air.
The same day it suspended three permissions for Iranian aviation. One let foreign airlines fly US-made or US-controlled aircraft into Iran. One allowed payments for flights over Iran. The third allowed fuel and emergency repairs in the US for airlines flying to Iran.
Scott Bessent’s warning on went further than the documents. On OFAC had said it would refuse most Iran licence requests, except where life or safety is at risk. The New York Times reported on that Iranian airlines had already begun to stop flying some foreign routes.
Sources: Al Jazeera, Federal Register (2), US Treasury, OFAC, New York Times
The Pattern
Since 2018 we found eight US deadlines like this one. In each, the US government named a future date for a ban or limit on a country’s planes or ships, in a published legal text. In seven, the ban started on the day named, with no delay, extension or withdrawal. Many cases come from Donald Trump’s two terms. The one miss and the one later pause both came out of talks with China.
Show the other 6 cases
The Read
History points to the cut-off happening on . In seven of eight past cases, a US ban or limit on a country’s planes or ships started on the day Washington named. The two closest cases are the same kind of document: OFAC licences that gave firms time to wind down deals with Belavia in 2023 and with Iran on aircraft sales in 2018. Both simply ran out. This licence also ends by itself unless OFAC issues a new one, and the Treasury Secretary repeated the date two days before.
The doubt comes from the one miss and the one later pause. In the US dropped its ban on Chinese airlines after Beijing gave way first. In it paused port fees on Chinese ships after a deal between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. Both were deals with the country targeted. Iran is not bargaining with Washington, but Donald Trump meets Xi Jinping on , and China buys a lot of Iranian oil.
A narrow new licence for safety or for flights over Iran before would make the cut-off less likely. The first sanctions on a foreign airport or fuel supplier would show that the threat is being enforced.
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