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U.S. Sanctions on Iran Oil Sector Proving to Be Effective

U.S. Sanctions on Iran Oil Sector Proving to Be Effective

By Shahriar Kia

The United States is implementing a maximum pressure campaign on Iran and the process of exiting the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as it is formally known, is nearly complete.

The Trump administration announced earlier this year that crippling economic sanctions would be re-imposed and that it expects all countries to reduce their imports of Iranian oil to zero. The deadline was the beginning of this month and a number of countries have been unable to fully comply. The United States has granted waivers to these countries, but on the condition that they gradually reduce their imports with the aim of reducing it to zero in time.

The crippling sanctions on the Iranian regime are already proving to have the intended effect. Its tracked oil exports have plummeted this month. Compared to last month, the oil exports are down by a few hundred thousand barrels per day.

One of the reasons for this is because clients have not put orders in for barrels because of the U.S. sanctions and the uncertainty with regards to them being able to get a waiver to continue importing the oil.

Analysts and experts in the industry, including Petro-Logistics – a tanker-tracking company, said that it is completely normal that the exports at the beginning of November would be significantly lower than the previous month because the United States had not yet issued waivers and there were no guarantees about who would be able to get them, if at all. Therefore, many of Iran’s clients did not order any volume of oil.

On November5th, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced in a press conference that temporary waivers would be issued to South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, Greece, Japan, China, India and Italy. Pompeo emphasised that the waivers are temporary and noted that waivers had been denied to several other European countries that requested them.

Iran’s exports of oil last month were estimated to be between 1.5 million barrels per day and 1.85 million barrels per day. Estimates for this month indicate that these figures dropped to around 1 million barrels per day. The highest level this year was in April when it was around 2.5. million barrels per day.

This shows that sanctions are working and it is essential for them to continue. The Trump administration has said that it will continue to reinforce sanctions and has not ruled out the possibility of applying new sanctions.

The people of Iran are inevitably feeling the effects of the sanctions but they welcome them. They know that the Iranian regime will never change and will never become moderate so they are taking their future into their own hands and working towards regime change.
So, as well as the pressure from the United States, the Iranian regime is also feeling the heat from the people of Iran. It is only a matter of time before the regime collapses and it will not be a day too soon for the people who are desperate for freedom, democracy and human rights.