UNITED NATIONS — The U.S. Treasury Department is widening sanctions against Iran, amid reports that the country is violating U.N. Security Council resolutions barring arms sales to Sudan.

The announcement yesterday of new sanctions against Iran’s largest state-owned shipping line came with a warning from American officials: Iran, they said, is adapting to American sanctions, making further international financial cooperation vital.

Following reports that an Iranian-made unmanned aircraft was shot down in Sudan’s Darfur region, a spokeswoman for the American mission to the United Nations, Carolyn Vadino, expressed concern about possible violations of Security Council resolutions banning the sale of arms to Sudan and other combatants in Darfur. “We are aware of the reports, and we are looking into them,” she said.

Sudan’s use of the Iranian drone aircraft in Darfur was first reported by a London-based newsletter, Africa Confidential. The Darfur rebel group Sudan Liberation Movement-Unity recovered parts of the aircraft and helped Western military experts identify its origin, the magazine reported.
Africa Confidential’s editor, Patrick Smith, told Voice of America that Iranian technicians based in Sudan likely operated the drone, which he said could carry a bomb of nearly 100 pounds.

While China and Russia are reported to have violated Security Council resolutions 1556 and 1591 imposing the arms embargo against Sudan, this is the first time Iran has been accused of such a breach. The report could further damage Iran’s diplomatic efforts to gain a seat on the 15-member council.

Iran is already accused of violating three council resolutions demanding the suspension of its uranium enrichment program. According to reports from Vienna yesterday, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei — whom American officials have criticized for being soft on Iran — plans to leave his post by November 30, the end of his current term.

The Treasury Department, meanwhile, announced new sanctions yesterday against the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines and 18 of its affiliated companies, saying the shipping line aids the “rogue activities of the regime in Tehran.”

“Not only does IRISL facilitate the transport of cargo for U.N. designated proliferators, it also falsifies documents and uses deceptive schemes to shroud its involvement in illicit commerce,” the department’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Stuart Levey, said in a statement.

Another Treasury Department official, Daniel Glaser, visited the United Nations yesterday, seeking support for U.N.-imposed measures and sanctions levied by the European Union and other countries.

To bypass sanctions on specific banks and companies involved in its nuclear program, Iran has created front companies, disguised transactions, and even used the Central Bank of Iran “to engage in deceptive transactions,” Mr. Glaser told reporters. “Iran is continuing to adjust to the efforts that the international financial community is taking, so we need to continue to work with each other and to work with our partners around the world to make sure that we stay one step ahead in this activity.”

Also yesterday, the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations, Mohammad Khazee, wrote to Secretary-General Ban to protest an Israeli Cabinet minister’s statement that Israel might consider kidnapping President Ahmadinejad to try him in an international court. “Iran is the last country that can lecture us” about such threats, the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, Gabriela Shalev, said yesterday in her first public statement since presenting her credentials to Mr. Ban.

Separately, the Anti-Defamation League yesterday denounced several religious groups — including the Mennonite Central Committee, the Quakers, the World Council of Churches, Religions for Peace, and the American Friends Service Committee — for planning to sponsor a dinner with Mr. Ahmadinejad on September 25, when the Iranian president is scheduled to attend the annual U.N. General Assembly session.