U.S. Exempts Japan and 10 Other Countries From Sanctions Over Iran Oil

[alp227]

Source: NYT

The Obama administration on Tuesday exempted Japan and 10 European nations from the prospect of biting sanctions intended to punish countries that continue to buy oil from Iran, but it left open the fate of other major importers, including China, India and South Korea.

The sanctions, ordered by Congress late last year to intensify diplomatic and economic pressure over Iran’s nuclear activities, have put the administration in the difficult position of threatening to punish some of the United States’ closest allies while it seeks to squeeze Iran’s main source of hard currency.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who announced the exemptions in a statement, cast them as evidence of the success of the new sanctions because the countries had cut imports. The United States, she said, was making progress in “shrinking Iran’s oil export markets and isolating its Central Bank from the world financial system.”

At a time when Israel has threatened military action against Iran and Republicans have criticized the administration’s approach, President Obama has argued that there is still time to resolve international concerns about Iran’s nuclear activities through diplomacy and increasingly punishing sanctions.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/world/middleeast/us-exempts-japan-and-10-others-from-iran-oil-sanctions.html

[Owlet]

1. I totally do not understand this:

The European Union has already joined the United States in increasing sanctions on Iran, banning new contracts for fuel in January and phasing out existing ones by July 1. That earned exemptions for Belgium, Britain, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain.

“These actions taken by these countries were not easy,” Mrs. Clinton said. “They had to rethink their energy needs at a critical time for the world economy and quickly begin to find alternatives to Iranian oil, which many had been reliant on.”

Maybe I just haven't had enough coffee yet, but those paragraphs make absolutely no sense to me.

[leveymg]

2. The Iran sanctions withhold supply from the market & keep oil prices high. The targeting of

Last edited Wed Mar 21, 2012, 12:55 PM - Edit history (1)

the three Asian economies is part of a trade war against them.

This confirms that sanctions have less to do with (nonexistent) Iranian nukes and more to do with the very real politics of oil, fragility of the Euro and US economy, and global imbalances in trade.

[dipsydoodle]

3. left open the fate of other major importers ?

She really should get a life if she thinks the US will influence China and India which for example uses gold and good / services as payment instead.

[marble falls]

4. Sanctions lite.

[lovuian]

5. This is such a joke

Hillary Why did you even go to sanctions in the first place when you knew you couldn't enforce them