Canadian Sanctions Are Liberal Warfare
Written by: Sara Birrell
During the second half of the 1940s, world governments sought distance themselves from the barbarism of the Second World War, the framework of the modern human rights era was constructed. But this new awareness of human rights wasn’t accompanied by a wave of anti-imperialist governments. It was less a new world order and more a revised set of rules for the old one – which meant, in part, finding new and “humane” strategies for maintaining Western hegemony while avoiding a repeat of the crimes of World War II. So the era of sanctions was born.
Although sanctions are often framed as a principled humanitarian effort to compel tyrannical governments to grant their citizens democratic freedoms, Yves Engler, a Canadian activist and author who has written extensively on foreign policy, says Canadians are mistaken not to view the aims of sanctions more critically. “We should look at our foreign policy decision makers through the lens of they’re probably pursuing policy because it advances empire and corporate interests,” he says.
As a member of the United Nations, Canada is legally required to impose sanctions on any nation the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has sanctioned, and it may decide to enforce autonomous sanctions as a matter of foreign policy. Those sanctions can take different forms, depending on the sociopolitical circumstances the sanctioning bodies are attempting to modify. They range from prohibitions on arms and the technical services relating to them, to freezing the assets of certain individuals and entities and prohibiting financial transactions, to broad restrictions on imports and exports. Currently, Canada has economic sanctions against 19 countries, 14 of which are sanctioned by the UNSC, 13 of which were formerly colonized by a G7 nation, and all but two of which were formerly colonized by one of Canada’s closest allies. Almost all of the sanctioned nations rank among the poorest countries in the world.
Engler doesn’t think that is a coincidence. “We live in a world where it’s incredibly hierarchical economically and Canada’s towards the top of that hierarchical economic order,” he says. “There are dominant countries and dominant countries like to have this tool in their back pocket of sanctioning governments when they’re not happy with those governments’ policy.”
Sanctions are typically imposed by wealthy Western states and the UNSC upon smaller nations in efforts to force regime changes that would better serve Western interests, allowing Western countries to carry out their imperialist aims without the high cost or bad optics of an invasion. Wealthy Western nations are rarely sanctioned, as they have the political strength to avoid it altogether, or to impose aggressive and damaging counter measures against anyone who attempts to sanction them. This inequality of global power helped the United States evade sanction for their illegal war of aggression in Iraq. “What drives sanctions policy is not whether a government is moral or democratic or not violating human rights,” says Engler. “Countries that are in the crosshairs of Washington are countries that get sanctions.”
One of the most heavily sanctioned countries in the world is Iran, which has been in Washington’s crosshairs for more than four decades. Dr. Parham Habibzadeh, an Iranian physician and researcher in human genetics at the University of Shiraz, says that sanctions on Iran by both the UNSC and Canada through the Special Economic Measures Act have had broad implications for medical research and treatment, despite the fact that the sanctions do not directly target those sectors. “We still have some limited access to medical supplies and collaboration is becoming possible, but all in all, the sanctions have made everything really difficult.”
Habibzadeh says those limitations became particularly acute as the country tried to respond to the coronavirus epidemic, which was first confirmed there in February. “The virus itself is borderless,” Habibzadeh says. “But our response is based on the supplies we have […] it would have definitely been easier for us to cope with the virus if we had free access to the global manufacturers and healthcare supply providers.”
Although sanctions are intended as a method of achieving geopolitical aims while causing less harm to civilian populations than outright war, many of the consequences that arise from them, like the limitations they have placed on Iranians’ ability to access medical treatment, violate the terms of the Geneva Conventions. Article 23 of the Conventions explicitly state that the public in a besieged state must be ensured food, medicine, and items of religious worship. “It should really be investigated from a humanitarian point of view,” says Habibzadeh.
In March, Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights confirmed Habibzadeh’s position, warning that sanctions on Iran, Yemen, and Venezuela are hindering those countries’ ability to respond to the coronavirus. Engler says that Canada, which has not eased sanctions in response to Bachelet’s report, is unlikely to be moved by international law. “I don’t think the Canadian government takes the Conventions or international law that seriously,” he says. “The Canadian government violates international law not irregularly. The sanctions example is just one of many examples of that.”
Although there are many reasons for imposing sanctions–for example, sanctions against North Korea are in place to prevent that country from developing nuclear weapons–forcing a regime change is by far the most common. That’s the case in Venezuela, which has been subject to sanctions from the US and Canada since 2017. Both of those countries backed an attempted coup against Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro in 2019 and Canada is a member of the Lima Group, a multilateral body whose express purpose is interfering in the domestic affairs of Venezuela. “It’s not really a hidden agenda,” says Dr. Kristin Ciupa, whose research is focused on the political economy of Venezuela. “The sanctions are trying to force a regime change. That’s pretty explicitly what they are.”
Venezuela isn’t the only Latin American country currently subject to sanctions following a failed coup, nor is it the only sanctioned nation in which the conditions reported by people inside the country differ from the conditions reported in the mainstream media. Canada and the US also have sanctions against Nicaragua, a frequent target for imperialist interference. The country, led by President Daniel Ortega, was subject to a failed US-backed coup in 2018, which attempted to impose a “rules-based market economy” there. The US imposed sanctions that year, and Canada followed a year later. According to the Government of Canada, the sanctions are a response to “gross and systematic human rights violations that have been committed” there. The non-profit NGO Human Rights Watch has praised the sanctions as something that will “open the door for accountability” in the country, which has reportedly seen hundreds of Nicaraguans killed by the state during peaceful protests since 2018.
But those allegations are difficult to prove, certainly for anyone living outside Nicaragua. Reports from within the country have both disputed the number of reported dead and pointed out that international media has misattributed lethal violence committed by opposition forces to Ortega’s Sandinista government. It may be true both that Ortega is ruling the country as a corrupt dictator and that international media is misreporting the current conditions within the country, but the fact remains that the sanctions are undemocratic, and being undemocratic, they cannot compel “appropriate steps to restore democratic rights,” as the Canadian government claims they are meant to.
“Rhetorically, the Liberal government says they’re enforcing an international rules based order,” Engler says. “That's an important part of their foreign policy branding or marketing, but in practice, it comes way more down to power and an assertion of power.”
The price of that assertion of power is disproportionately paid by the public. A 2017 report from the Centre for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) said that sanctions–not socialism–have severely reduced the caloric intake of Venezuelans and contributed to an electricity crisis that has impacted the ability of hospitals to provide life-saving care. Mortality has increased by 31 per cent and those who are impacted the most are children, people who are pregnant or nursing, the poor, LGBTQ people, Indigenous people, and people with disabilities–groups that the Geneva Conventions single out as particularly vulnerable and in need of protection under the rules of war. Although “collective penalties” for civilians are prohibited under Article 33 of the Geneva Conventions, poor, Indigenous, and racialized Venezuelans are collectively paying the price for sanctions.
Despite the wide scope of their consequences, research on sanctions has consistently found that they’re strikingly ineffective in achieving their intended aims. One study found that they fail between 65-95 per cent of the time. But Engler says that if you consider the unofficial intentions of sanctions – what he refers to as “the empire trying to punish” – it becomes clear that they’re actually quite effective. “For instance, you know in Venezuela, sanctions have not been successful in their immediate ostensible objective, which is to overthrow the government of Maduro. But I think that it would be a mistake that they don't send a very clear message to other countries to follow orders.”
The devastating impacts of sanctions on civilian populations are not unknown – in 1998, then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Anan acknowledged that “humanitarian and human rights policy goals cannot easily be reconciled with those of […] sanctions.” Over the years there have been attempts at reforms, or “smarter sanctions,” that would mitigate the impact on the public, but those attempts have largely failed. Sanctions themselves were once a reform – a smarter way of waging war – and it is not the mechanics of how they are applied that poses the problem, but rather the political ideologies and global hierarchies they are deployed to maintain. To achieve the goals of sanctions, a certain amount of human suffering is practical and even necessary for achieving the desired results. “Everyone is affected,” Habibzadeh says of sanctions. “No one is exempted.”
Sanctions are often justified as the only alternative to military intervention, but Engler says viewing those two instruments as the only tools available “tends to reinforce global power imbalances.” He says that there are many alternatives for ensuring that Canada’s foreign policy is just. “Everything from, you know, simple votes at the UN, to withdrawing aid, to the more substantial, which is, stop contributing to the harm.”
While it’s difficult to envision the Liberal government – or any Canadian government – committing to justice abroad while they continue to violate Indigenous sovereignty at home, there are signs that the world has begun to take note of Canada’s troubling foreign policy. Amnesty International has an active campaign calling on Canada to end its multibillion-dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia, which is behind Yemen’s civil war (Yemen is currently under sanction related to that war. Saudi Arabia is not). In June, Canada also lost its bid for a seat on the UNSC to Norway – something that was widely considered a rebuke of its foreign policy.
According to Engler, it’s Canadians who need to come to terms with the realities of the country’s actions abroad. “The vast majority of Canadians think Canada is a force for good in the world,” he says. “They trust that politicians will do what’s right and democratic and moral, based on the simple principle that you treat others how you want to be treated. And in fact, history suggests they do the opposite.”
Sara Birrell is an anti-capitalist writer, student, and rank-and-file union member. Her reporting has appeared in Briarpatch Magazine, Sask Dispatch, Passage, Media Co-op, and the Carillon. She's a settler from southern Saskatchewan.
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