Abstract
This study is the first extensive overview of the environmental impacts of sanctions on Iran. Generally, these sanctions have impacted its environment by:
• restricting access to technology, service, and know-how;
• blocking international aid for the environment; and
• increasing the natural resource-intensity of the economy.
Overall, they have made production much costlier to the environment, which political leaders do not consider a policy priority as they manage Iran in survival mode while aggressively pursuing their ideology. Sanctions have not been designed to cause environmental damage. Nor have response strategies been intended to harm the environment. Nonetheless, environmental damages are the inevitable outcome of the interdependent processes of enforcement and response. This study calls for increased attention to the unintended, trans-generational and trans-boundary environmental impacts of sanctions and exploring their potential human rights implications, for which both sanctioner and sanctionee should be held accountable