The Biden administration lifted sanctions on more than a dozen former Iranian officials and energy companies, an action that comes amid stalled nuclear negotiations and that U.S. officials said signals Washington’s commitment to easing a broader pressure campaign if Tehran changes its behavior.

The U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday repealed sanctions against former senior National Iranian Oil Co. officials and several companies involved in shipping and trading petrochemical products.

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However, the U.S. also levied new sanctions against a group of men and companies that U.S. officials said are helping fund Iran’s blacklisted military unit, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Houthi rebels in Yemen.

“These actions demonstrate our commitment to lifting sanctions in the event of a change in status or behavior by sanctioned persons,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said.

U.S. and Iranian negotiators, meanwhile, have struggled to bridge significant gaps in nuclear and security talks.

Anti-money-laundering charges against MoneyGram International Inc. were dismissed after prosecutors said the money-transfer company had complied with the terms of a long-running settlement agreement.

The order by Judge Christopher Conner of the U.S. District Court in Harrisburg, Pa., on Thursday brought to a close MoneyGram’s more than eight-year effort to win the U.S. Justice Department’s approval for its compliance program. Prosecutors last month asked Judge Conner to dismiss a court filing from 2012 that charged the Dallas-based company with aiding and abetting wire fraud and violating the Bank Secrecy Act.

Peugeot and Citroën have become the latest auto makers to face preliminary charges in France on suspicion of emissions fraud, extending the fallout from a yearslong scandal that engulfed the auto industry after Volkswagen AG admitted to cheating in pollution tests.

Stellantis NV, the auto giant that owns the French brands, said the judicial court of Paris had ordered both car makers to pay bail and provide bank guarantees to cover potential damages. The probe relates to the sale of diesel vehicles in France between 2009 and 2015.

Stellantis said another of its subsidiaries, Fiat Chrysler, had been summoned to appear before a court in Paris in the coming weeks as part of the same investigation.

• The top global standard setter for banking regulation proposed a strict new rule that would require banks to essentially set aside a dollar in capital for every dollar of bitcoin they own. The Basel Committee for Banking Supervision, a group of global central bankers and regulators, announced the plan Thursday in a public consultation about how it intends to treat cryptocurrency assets, which it said had prompted concerns about consumer protection, money laundering and terrorist financing.
   
• China enacted a new law aimed at countering foreign sanctions, in response to U.S. and European efforts to pressure Beijing on issues spanning human rights, trade and technology. Senior members of China’s legislature approved the “anti-foreign-sanctions law” on Thursday, state media said, following an expedited process that skipped public consultation and involved lawmakers reviewing the bill twice instead of the usual three times.
   
• Authorities in China escalated their campaign against cryptocurrencies, arresting more than 1,100 people suspected of using the digital assets to launder ill-gotten funds and ordering mines to shut down in one of its western provinces. In a swoop spanning 23 provinces, regions and cities, Chinese police on Wednesday rounded up more than 170 criminal groups that engaged in cryptocurrency trading in order to launder money obtained via telephone and online scams, the Ministry of Public Security said in a statement.
   
• A European Union privacy regulator has proposed a fine of more than $425 million against Amazon.com Inc., part of a process that could yield the biggest-yet penalty under the bloc’s privacy law, people familiar with the matter said. Luxembourg’s data-protection commission, the CNPD, has circulated a draft decision sanctioning Amazon’s privacy practices and proposing the fine among the bloc’s 26 other national authorities, the people said. The CNPD is Amazon’s lead privacy regulator in the EU because Amazon has its EU headquarters in the Grand Duchy.

A ransomware attack on a national hospital chain nearly brought Las Vegas hospitals to their knees. Another attack in Oregon abruptly shut down alerts tied to patient monitors tracking vital signs. In New York, one county’s only trauma center briefly closed to ambulances, with the nearest alternative 90 miles away.

Multiple attacks were carried out in recent months against U.S. hospitals, suspending some surgeries, delaying medical care and costing hospitals millions of dollars.

The Wall Street Journal tracked the most disruptive attacks to one group: a notorious gang of Eastern European cybercriminals once called the “Business Club,” with ties to Russian government security services, according to threat analysts and former law-enforcement officials who closely follow Eastern European cybercrime operations.

• Electronic Arts Inc. said Thursday that hackers stole source code on its “FIFA 21” videogame. The maker and publisher of popular franchises such as FIFA, The Sims and Madden NFL said player data wasn’t accessed.

• After Colonial Pipeline Co. on May 8 paid roughly $4.4 million in cryptocurrency to hackers holding its computer systems hostage, the Federal Bureau of Investigation followed the digital money. The seizure of more than half of the payment cuts against crypto’s reputation as an untraceable financial medium for hackers. 
   
• Ransomware Attack Roiled Meat Giant JBS, Then Spilled Over to Farmers and Restaurants

Europe is preparing legislation that would jolt the rules of international trade by taxing imported goods based on the greenhouse gases emitted to make them, a plan that has sent shudders through the world’s supply chains and unsettled big trading partners such as the U.S., Russia and China.

The European Union plan, due to be announced next month, is generating debate ahead of a summit of the leaders of the Group of Seven rich countries in southwestern England starting Friday, where the international response to climate change is set to be a central topic.

The EU proposal would open up a new front in the fight against climate change by setting the world’s first limits on carbon in traded goods.

• The Biden administration is implementing Covid-19 workplace safety rules for millions of healthcare workers, limiting a plan that could have extended across industries.
   
• The U.S. government has halted new shipments of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, according to state and federal health officials, one of several steps federal agencies are taking that could help clear a backlog of unused doses before they expire.
   
• A plan to revive a stumbling campaign to get Covid-19 vaccines to developing countries got a critical boost with the announcement that the U.S. will donate 500 million shots developed by BioNTech SE and Pfizer Inc. by June next year.

Send comments to the Risk & Compliance editor, Jack Hagel, at jack.hagel@wsj.com

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