Should Iran still be sanctioned during the pandemic?
Calls are growing for sanctions relief as Covid-19 bites hard in Iran, but Tehran continues to orchestrate attacks
The United States has ruthlessly maintained its “maximum pressure” policy of punitive sanctions against Iran, despite coronavirus taking a catastrophic toll on the Middle Eastern country.
On Wednesday, officials in Tehran reported the nation’s single biggest jump in deaths from Covid-19 as another 147 people died - bringing the total to 1,135. On the same day, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced a new raft of sanctions.
Iran is suffering from a devastating shortage of supplies, but the measures, Pompeo said, were designed to “further Iran’s economic and diplomatic isolation”.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Iran and the US have been engaged in a series of retaliatory strikes against each other since the killing of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in January, even as, in the same period, the world’s attention has swung almost entirely to the mushrooming coronavirus pandemic.
The Iranian government has not wavered in its bellicose stance towards the US, despite being mired in an outbreak that has killed a number of senior figures in the regime, and continues to infect and kill its people at a rate The Atlantic says is “perhaps hundreds of times greater than the official number”.
“The Americans assassinated our great commander. We have responded to that terrorist act and will respond to it,” Rouhani said in a televised speech yesterday.
On Tuesday, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif called for countries to ignore the sanctions, which he said had been “impairing” Iran’s “ability to fight Covid-19”.
The measures announced yesterday by Pompeo seemed calibrated to emphasise to international companies that the coronavirus outbreak would not stop them enforcing their restrictions.
Eight non-Iranian companies were sanctioned on Wednesday for “knowingly engaging in a significant transaction for the purchase, acquisition, sale, transport, or marketing of petrochemical products from Iran” - three from China, three from Hong-Kong and two from South Africa.
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––For a round-up of the most important stories from around the world - and a concise, refreshing and balanced take on the week’s news agenda - try The Week magazine. Get your first six issues free–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Pressure is growing on Washington to reduce or pause sanctions because of the pandemic. China, Russia and Pakistan have all this week called for sanctions to be lifted.
“US sanctions, imposed within the framework of the maximum pressure campaign, pose a serious obstacle to efficient measures against the infection,” said the Russian Foreign Ministry on Monday. “Millions of Iranian citizens have been deprived of the opportunity to purchase vital medical items... We deeply regret, we are alarmed and seriously concerned by the anti-humane US policies.”
In a Tuesday appearance on Iranian television, Dr Afruz Eslami, a state journalist who is also a medical doctor, cited a study by Tehran’s Sharif University of Technology, which claims that a worst-case scenario could see 3.5 million Iranians die from Covid-19.
In February, the US and Switzerland launched a humanitarian channel aimed at mitigating the effects of sanctions as Iran combats the outbreak.
The link, says The Wall Street Journal, “allows international firms to trade in goods such as medical supplies, agricultural commodities and basic necessities without risk of U.S. sanctions-enforcement penalties”.
However, the crisis is worsening and, writing in The Intercept, Mehdi Hassan says “sanctions relief... needs to go much further and much faster.”
There is no doubt that sanctions relief is one of the central aims of Iranian foreign policy, and the authorities in Tehran are attempting to leverage the coronavirus tragedy to achieve this goal, all while they continue to launch missile attacks against the US and its allies - with a British service member killed last week in a strike.
What’s more, says The Guardian, “the Trump administration believes the Iranians are using sanctions as an excuse to hide their own incompetence, including a reluctance to take the necessary tough measures to restrict population movements”.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
William Gritten is a London-born, New York-based strategist and writer focusing on politics and international affairs.
-
'Virtual prisons': how tech could let offenders serve time at home
Under The Radar New technology offers opportunities to address the jails crisis but does it 'miss the point'?
By Chas Newkey-Burden, The Week UK Published
-
The Week contest: Airport goodbyes
Puzzles and Quizzes
By The Week US Published
-
'We shouldn't be surprised that crypto is back'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By Justin Klawans, The Week US Published
-
Covid-19: what to know about UK's new Juno and Pirola variants
in depth Rapidly spreading new JN.1 strain is 'yet another reminder that the pandemic is far from over'
By Arion McNicoll, The Week UK Published
-
Vallance diaries: Boris Johnson 'bamboozled' by Covid science
Speed Read Then PM struggled to get his head around key terms and stats, chief scientific advisor claims
By The Week UK Published
-
Good health news: seven surprising medical discoveries made in 2023
In Depth A fingerprint test for cancer, a menopause patch and the shocking impacts of body odour are just a few of the developments made this year
By The Week Staff Published
-
Who is poisoning Iran's schoolgirls, and why hasn't Iran's government stopped them?
Speed Read
By Peter Weber Published
-
How serious a threat is new Omicron Covid variant XBB.1.5?
feature The so-called Kraken strain can bind more tightly to ‘the doors the virus uses to enter our cells’
By Chas Newkey-Burden Published
-
Will new ‘bivalent booster’ head off a winter Covid wave?
Today's Big Question The jab combines the original form of the Covid vaccine with a version tailored for Omicron
By The Week Staff Published
-
Can North Korea control a major Covid outbreak?
feature Notoriously secretive state ‘on verge of catastrophe’
By The Week Staff Last updated
-
Did Sweden’s Covid-19 experiment pay off in the end?
In Depth Scandinavian country had lower excess death rate than many but immigrants and elderly bore the brunt
By The Week Staff Last updated