By Finian Cunningham

April 01, 2020 "Information Clearing House" -   Dozens of U.S. government-chartered flights have begun to airlift vital medical equipment and supplies from China to the U.S. as the latter becomes the world’s biggest case load of infections from the novel coronavirus. There are grim forecasts for the number of deaths in the U.S. as the pandemic is weeks from peaking there.

China is cooperating with the U.S. in organizing the massive medical transfer, naturally of course, given the humanitarian crisis. You would think therefore that a little reciprocation would be in order from Washington. After all, China is one of those foreign countries that the U.S. has imposed sanctions on over alleged human rights violations. Would it not behove the U.S. to show a bit of solidarity and gratitude by dropping its sanctions regime against China?

And not just China. There are are some 30 countries and territories that currently sit on a U.S. sanctions list, mostly due to Washington’s accusations of human rights violations. Some of the targeted nations have been under sanctions for decades, such as Cuba, North Korea and Iran. Others have joined the dubious club more recently, such as Russia, Yemen and Venezuela.

Surely at this unprecedented time of a global pandemic threatening millions of human beings regardless of nationality, it is time to show genuine solidarity and compassion for others. The very idea of imposing sanctions on other countries is not only anachronistic. It is utterly barbaric.

In any case, U.S. sanctions imposed unilaterally without the mandate of the UN Security Council are arguably illegal. Even before the coronavirus outbreak and its accompanying disease, Covid-19, the American deployment of embargoes to disrupt commerce and trade of other countries could be seen as reprehensible. Such measures are rightly judged to be collective punishment of civilians which violates international law and the UN Charter.

But now as countries battle against an existential threat posed by the virus, the existing U.S. sanctions can be seen as an abomination.

Iran is a particularly poignant case. It has one of the highest infection rates in the world with thousands of deaths in a matter of weeks. Yet the Trump administration sees fit to not only maintain harsh sanctions on Tehran, it has actually added three more rounds of sanctions against Iran since the epidemic occurred. The deaths in Iran are being multiplied by American policy.

The Trump administration cynically claims that U.S. sanctions do not impede humanitarian aid to Iran. The claim is beneath contempt. The crippling sanctions imposed by Trump’s “maximum pressure” policy virtually precludes Iran from making international financial transactions, including for medicines. Moreover, the effect of “secondary sanctions” means that many countries are intimidated from doing business with Iran out of fear of U.S. reprisals.