COVID-19 pandemic intensifies Iran sanctions debate
Iran hawks are doubling down on sanctions amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and Democrats can’t agree on how much relief the United States should give Iran.
The global COVID-19 pandemic has added a new sense of urgency to the political debate over whether — and to what extent — the United States should lift sanctions on Iran as it struggles to adequately contain the coronavirus.
Iranian leaders have largely asserted that the US sanctions regime has hindered its COVID-19 response, noting that it has resulted in significant shortages of medical supplies. The Donald Trump administration released a State Department fact sheet this week dismissing the claims as “Iran’s sanctions relief scam.”
And while Democrats have universally called on the Trump administration to provide more leeway for humanitarian trade with Iran, the more hawkish and progressive wings of the party are divided on whether to lift the broader sectoral sanctions.
The Trump administration counters that the Treasury Department issued a general license exemption for humanitarian trade through Iran’s Central Bank in February — after a counterterrorism designation last year effectively cut off exemptions for medical and agricultural trade. Notably, the United States did not object last week when Europe used its new humanitarian trade mechanism INSTEX to facilitate the delivery of medical goods to Iran for the first time.
