By Abdollah Farajirad

Strategic Council Online-Sanctions are used as a tool or effort for imposing pressure on a country or countries with the goal of forcing them to show specific behavior.

The sanctions under UN Security Council can naturally make many countries satisfied to go along with. It means that the UN members are obliged to impose these sanctions like sanctions imposed on Iraq under Oil-for-Food Program by which many countries mostly abide. Eventually these sanctions paved the way for Saddam’s regime fall.

Some sanctions are imposed by lobbying and these days such sanctions are highlighted to which the sanctions Imposed by the U.S after withdrawing from Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) can be referred. In fact Washington is lobbying with different countries for imposing sanctions on Iran against the UN Security Council resolutions. Through these measures, the U.S is persuading or threatening some countries to follow its unilateral sanctions against Iran. Some countries are forced to abide by the U.S sanctions unless their interest will be in danger.

Given the U.S sanctions due to Imposed against Iran in November, it must be stressed that these sanctions are against the international laws and sanctions imposed prior to JCPOA. The same sanctions are imposed against Venezuela but sanctions on Iran are tougher and harder because Venezuela’ trade activities with the world are more limited and it mostly has trade cooperation with Latin America. Naturally, among Latin Americas’ countries Brazil has the leading role and in fact these countries are not in the position to impose the U.S policies on Venezuela.

While The U.S sanctions have some effects on Venezuela and made some crises,

the Inefficiency of the government leads the country to face with the increasing problems.

In regard to effectiveness of the unilateral sanctions it must be emphasized that these measures have some effects. For example, since the West sanction, Russia has lost %60 of its currency’s’ value. It must be mentioned that Russia’s sanctions are not as hard as Iran’s sanctions before JCPOA or the sanctions against Iraq prior to Saddam’s fall.

On the other hand, North Korea has experienced the worst economic situations in past 20 years so its leader is now trying to reach an agreement with the U.S in order to find a way to manage the country.

For the time being, the policy of pressure and coercion is on the Trump’s America agenda. Recently the deputy of Secretary of the U.S Treasury Department on his trip to Turkey announced that Iran was not Ankara’s friend but the U.S was Turkey’s ally and friend and if Ankara was to cooperate with Iran at the time of sanctions it would be faced with the U.S sanctions.

The U.S has started negotiations with China, Japan and India about Iran so Iran needs to use some mechanism to downgrade the effectiveness of Washington’s sanctions. Also Trump has taken harsh stance against Iran while previous U.S administrations tried to respect some norms for example South Korea, India or Japan could buy Iran’s oil but Trump Administration announced to reduce Iran’s oil exports to zero.

The U.S has withdrawn from JCPOA but because of the U.S problematic measures

regarding NATO, Paris climate agreement, tariff war with some countries, and Iran nuclear agreement as well, Washington’s allies are opposing White House actions so Iran can use this opportunity to futile the U.S plans to increase pressure against Tehran and Iranian nation.

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