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All tagged John Bolton
◢ The Treasury Department has announced that it will operationalize a financial channel to facilitate humanitarian trade with Iran, after privately acknowledging to European officials that recent sanctions imposed on the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) risked encumbering trade in food and medicine. But the new channel may cause more problems than it solves.
◢ John Bolton doggedly pursued maximum pressure, pushing aside the concerns expressed the secretary of state, secretary of treasury, military leaders and intelligence officials alike. While Trump’s antagonism towards the Iran nuclear deal predates his appointment of Bolton, the transformation of the Trump administration’s Iran policy into one of “economic war” was nonetheless dependent on Bolton’s ideological fixations.
◢ Last year, the Swiss government opened negotiations with the Trump administration to ensure that Switzerland’s significant sales of pharmaceutical products and medical devices—technically exempt from U.S. sanctions—could continue unimpeded. But the National Security Council has so far prevented the Swiss effort to ease trade in food and medicine in a remarkable subversion of longstanding U.S. protections for humanitarian trade with Iran.
◢ The JCPOA continues to hang together—but only just. There are growing indications of signatory states’ fatigue and frustration in attempting to prevent the collapse of the JCPOA, following the US withdrawal from it last May. In this climate, it is important for the deal’s stakeholders to remember why it remains valuable
◢ John Bolton's appointment as Trump's new national security advisor likely spells the end of the JCPOA as we know it. Bolton is a vocal opponent of the deal and seeks military confrontation with Iran.
◢ But while Trump may finally nix the Iran Deal, he will cannot impede the forces that brought it into existence. In the long run, Iran's geopolitical significance and need for engagement will outlast Trump and keep Iran at the table alongside reasonable actors in the international community.
