Sanctions are a long-used tool designed as an alternative to military force and with the objective of changing governments’ behaviour, but they also end up hurting civilian citizens.
If in doubt, take a look at 47 years of U.S.-imposed sanctions against Iran, during which sanctions regimes have neither decreased prospects of a military encounter nor altered the policies of Iranian leaders.
Rather, they have negatively impacted Iranian society because of their broad nature affecting business, health, education and humanitarian aspects of life.
In mid-January, 2026, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) clamped new sanctions on ships for allegedly transporting Iranian oil to international markets, in violation of unilateral U.S. sanctions.
The U.S. government is relying on energy policies and oil sanctions, to force Iran to back down after it rejected a demand to halt its nuclear programme.
U.S. sanctions on Iran date back to the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which ended Washington’s alliance with the former Shah. Nearly five decades later, those sanctions remain in force.
What began with frozen Iranian assets in U.S. banks, has since expanded, tied to disputes over Tehran’s regional policy, nuclear program, and ballistic missile development.
U.S. sanctions have intensified under Washington’s so-called “maximum pressure campaign”, targeting Iran’s foreign trade, particularly petrochemical exports. It began under President Donald Trump’s first term and has accelerated since his return to office in January 2025.
The sanctions now hit Iran’s energy, shipping, and financial sectors, with negative effects across a broad spectrum of society. Inflation above 50 percent and a steep currency decline of 90 percent have pushed up prices and weakened purchasing power.
While U.S. sanctions officially target specific sectors, their impact has been far-reaching, fuelling shortages and renewing debate over their effectiveness and humanitarian cost.
The U.S. sanctions have not changed Iran’s regional policy or its stand on the nuclear programme and ballistic missiles. The United States is demanding a zero-enrichment policy and limiting the range of Iran’s missiles to about 500 kilometres.
With Iran declaring the U.S. conditions its "red lines," there are no promising prospects on easing of U.S. sanctions, let alone removing them, in the near future.
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Azerbaijan’s participation in the United States-backed Board of Peace reflects a clear calculation of national interest, according to Chingiz Mammadov, Research Alumni of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the Woodrow Wilson International Center.
Turkish defence firm Aselsan announced on Monday that it had signed a deal with the NATO alliance, of which Türkiye is a longstanding member, for the supply of “Identification of Friend or Foe” (IFF) interrogator systems for use with Man-Portable Air Defense Systems, or MANPADS.
Secret negotiations between U.S. officials and the Taliban over remaining American detainees have stalled, after the Taliban publicly tied any further releases to the fate of the last Afghan held at Guantánamo Bay, according to a report by The New York Times published on 26 January 2026.
High-level diplomatic consultations were held in Istanbul, Türkiye, on Monday as Ankara seeks to solidify the fragile progress of the Gaza ceasefire and accelerate the delivery of life-saving assistance to the strip.
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