Tehran Times - Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaeili announced on Tuesday that 11 individuals were found guilty of disrupting the country’s foreign currency market last week.

During his weekly press conference, Esmaeili said the defendants were sentenced due to smuggling foreign currency and gold, ISNA reported.

“The Judiciary, due to the current economic condition of the country, is determined in punishing those who commit such crimes,” he pointed out.

Earlier this month, President Hassan Rouhani blamed Washington for “new plots” to harm Iran’s economy by disrupting the country’s foreign currency market.

To offset the impacts of U.S. sanctions intended to strangulate the Iranian economy, Iranian industrialists should boost production and increase exports, Rouhani was quoted as saying.

The Iranian government is making all efforts to remove the obstacles in the way of production, the president said.

In recent months, Iran’s Judiciary has shown determination to fight those who disrupt the Iranian economy.

Back in May, Esmaeili announced that two of the defendants in corruption cases were sentenced to death.

The defendants, a husband and a wife, were involved in manipulating the foreign exchange and gold markets and hoarding cars from Siapa Company.

“In a case that had more than 50 defendants, more than 40 people were indicted and 34 defendants were convicted in the court,” Esmaeili said during a press conference.

“In this case, part of which was disruption of the foreign exchange market and another part was disruption of the auto industry and gold coin market; Vahid Behzadi, the son of Aboutaleb, and his wife Najva Lashidaee were sentenced to death for participating in disruption of the economic system through registering fake orders and an illegal exchange shop, and pre-purchasing more than 6,700 vehicles from Saipa Company and participating in money laundering amounting to 32,000 billion [rials],” he said.

The spokesman added that 24,000 Azadi gold coins and 100 kilograms of gold were found in their house.

Esmaeili also said former CEO of Saipa Mehdi Jamali was sentenced to seven years in prison; former deputy director of Saipa’s marketing Reza Taghizadeh to 15 years; MP Mohammad Azizi to 61 months; Fereydoon Ahmadi to 61 months; and former head of Saipa’s security Hossein Hashtroodi to 61 months.