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| Ayatollahs regularly hang political prisoners. |
Squeezed By U.S. Sanctions, Iran Has
Had An Especially Bad 2018: One of candidate Donald Trump's pledges during the
2016 election campaign was to get tougher on Iran. He slammed the 2015 Iran
nuclear deal as a lopsided giveaway to Tehran, and promised a return of
American sanctions on Iran.
President Trump has been true to his word, making 2018 a difficult year
for Iran. Although other countries have stuck with the Joint Comprehensive Plan
of Action signed with Iran, Trump pulled the United States out of the deal in
May and announced that U.S. economic sanctions on Iran would return in two
phases.
Some of the most painful ones —
targeting Iran's oil exports, its main economic lifeline — kicked back in last
month. (They were less painful than they might have been, however: Washington
granted waivers to eight countries, including China, India and Japan, the
world's biggest importers of Iranian crude.)
The European Union, one of the deal's
signatories, vowed to create a mechanism to keep doing business with Iran
despite the American sanctions, but so far it hasn't materialized. The results
to date have included defiant rhetoric from Iranian leaders, economic pain felt
by ordinary Iranians and a political weakening of President Hassan Rouhani,
who's under increasing attack from hard-line conservative forces.
