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The Takeaway: March 4, 2020

Highlights: Pompeo offer on coronavirus creates opening for Iran; Economic costs of virus may outlast public health impact; Three things to watch in Putin-Erdogan summit tomorrow; ‘Heart’ of Lebanese protests; and more!

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei spoke about the coronavirus at a ceremony marking the National Week of Natural Resources in Tehran, Iran, March 3, 2020. — Khamenei.ir
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Three quick takes:
 
 
 
 

1. US offer of help on coronavirus gives Iran chance to finally take up Trump’s offer to talk

 

Iran President Hassan Rouhani spurned US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo’s offer to “assist the Iranian people” in responding to the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, saying today that “our people know very well you are lying” and calling on the US to lift sanctions on Iran that are preventing imports of vital pharmaceuticals.

 

The US allows broad medical exemptions to sanctions, including via the recently established Swiss Humanitarian Trade Arrangement.

 

But Tehran should think again. It could use more international help to combat the virus, including via expansion of the humanitarian trade agreement, and should consider the US gesture as a confidence-building measure to work from to pave the way for greater de-escalation.

 

Virus “widespread”: While China’s incidences of COVID-19 are declining, Iran’s are spiking (albeit from a lower base). Confirmed COVID-19 cases in Iran are now at 2,992 with 92 deaths so far. Twenty-three members of the Iranian Consultative Assembly (parliament) have contracted the virus, along with a vice president. Rouhani said today that the virus is “widespread” and “encompasses almost all of our provinces.”

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