The special representative for Iran, Brian Hook, remarked that "our pressure campaign is designed to deny Iran the money it needs to not only fund regional militias, the regional aggression that we see Iran performing year in and year out, but it's also to deny Iran the revenue that it needs to do things like conduct assassination attempts in Europe, bomb plots in Europe, and illegal drug smuggling through Europe". Hook also described European efforts to set up a special purpose vehicle as "the wrong signal at the wrong time".