This happened in May of last year – one more reason why Iran is on the West’s *hit list.

A billionaire businessman at the heart of a $2.6 billion state bank scam, the largest fraud case since the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, was executed Saturday, state television reported.

Authorities put Mahafarid Amir Khosravi, also known as Amir Mansour Aria, to death at Evin prison, just north of the capital, Tehran, the station reported. The report said the execution came after Iran’s Supreme Court upheld his death sentence.

* * *

The fraud involved using forged documents to get credit at one of Iran’s top financial institutions, Bank Saderat, to purchase assets including state-owned companies like major steel producer Khuzestan Steel Co.

Khosravi’s business empire included more than 35 companies from mineral water production to a football club and meat imports from Brazil. According to Iranian media reports, the bank fraud began in 2007.

A total of 39 defendants were convicted in the case. Four received death sentences, two got life sentences and the rest received sentences of up to 25 years in prison.

Iranians don’t mess around. They mean business.

Meanwhile, here in the states, banks get privatization, de-regulation, $700 billion bailouts, and token civil penalties instead of criminal prosecutions, for far worse crimes.

So, really, what the West doesn’t like about Iran is not their nuclear program, but their no nonsense method for dealing with bank fraud.