
New documents link Huawei to suspected front companies in Iran, Syria - jmsflknr
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-huawei-iran-exclusive/exclusive-new-documents-link-huawei-to-suspected-front-companies-in-iran-syria-idUSKCN1P21MH
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syntaxing
Warranted or not, sanctions can be seen as one step before war. It's an
effective method to hit them where it hurts (their pockets) without creating
casualties directly. The whole point of sanctions is to drive the enemies GDP
down on purpose to "flex your arms". It does not matter whether the sanctioned
goods are dangerous or not. Once again, the ultimate goal is to smother their
GDP growth. And like all foreign policy tools, it's meant to be political. The
US has laws and I expect our justice department to arrest those who break our
laws regardless of their nationality if they step into our country (or
allies). Just like how the Chinese would arrest any US citizen if we break
their laws when we step into their country.

The WTO submitted a report last year about the efficacy of sanctions (and it
happens to be on Iran) for those curious [1].

[1]
[https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/reser_e/ersd201803_e.pdf](https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/reser_e/ersd201803_e.pdf)

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rgbrenner
Important point, these were UN sanctions that Huawei was violating. That means
China also agreed to them.. and not in some minor vote... they are a permanent
member of the UN Security Council, and therefore have a veto they could have
used to reject it entirely... and they don't need anyones permission to use
their veto. So it's safe to say China also agreed to sanction Iran, which they
failed to do.

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gcbw2
Doesn't to appear to be a U.N. sanction, maybe it is indeed "only" a US
sanction.

the last UN resolution lifts all sanctions:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Nations_resolut...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Nations_resolutions_concerning_Iran)

> United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231 - Passed 20 July 2015.
> Endorsed the Iran Nuclear Deal and lifted all previous sanctions on Iran
> provided that Iran remains in compliance with its responsibilities in the
> nuclear deal.

(just went to wikipedia now, not an authority on the subject)

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free652
There were breaking UN sanctions when they were in place.

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tempguy095432
UN sanctions were only on nuclear weapon related items. They were breaking US
led (EU accepted those as well) sanctions on banking.

It's says so in the new report above. Also
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctions_against_Iran](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctions_against_Iran)
although wikipedia, it clearly states UN had no banking restrictions over iran
from 2006.

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rgbrenner
It does have banking restrictions on nuclear weapon related items. Computer
equipment is dual use, and can be used to further nuclear weapons research and
test nuclear weapon designs. In fact, it's a critical part in developing
modern nuclear weapons.

And of course the US has laws to enforce the sanctions they agreed (and China
agreed) to implement under the UN resolutions.

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tempguy095432
Dual use only contains items which can be directly used in nuclear weapon
research and not any other thing. Some computer equipment specific to nuclear
research is dual use.

It doesn't outlaw for example concrete just because concrete can be used to
make nuclear reactors.

US sanctions, china never agreed on them. India another example didn't agree
on them and traded oil with Iran for other non nuclear related items even
during US sanctions. They didn't use US and EU banks to do this but they did
indeed trade. The only problem here is Huawei used international banks to do
the trade. The items are fine to be traded.

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paulmd
This is from 5+ years ago, you gotta ask why this is being released _now_.

I can see why it's a bad idea to have Chinese gear in our networks, but this
is something completely unrelated except in the vague sense of "china bad".
You can argue for getting Huawei out of our networks on their own merit
without this crap.

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jpollock
This is related to Huawei's CFO's arrest in Canada and pending hearing to
decide if she will be extradited to the USA.

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simplecomplex
Can someone explain how the world is a better place by outlawing business with
Iran? Remember, the crime here is selling telecom equipment...

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austinheap
The goal of most sanctions, from a diplomatic perspective, is to place
enormous financial pressure on an economy so that the population revolts
agains the government in question. It's believed that when the "price of
onions" becomes too high for a society to tolerate, revolution occurs.

I'm not saying the world is/isn't a better place, just explaining the common
beltway logic re: Iran sanctions.

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rgbrenner
The goal of the sanctions is to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
The sanctions cause economic harm, forcing Iran to the negotiating table.

It's not anyone's goal to overthrow Iran. No one want to clean up the mess.
There are already enough messes in that region already (afghanistan, iraq,
syria, yemen).

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austinheap
America has been diligently trying to overthrow the Iranian government for
nearly 70 years, _long_ before Iran started their nuclear program in 1970:

In 1953, the CIA baited the Iranian coup d'état by covertly supporting pro-
shaw groups. The shaw was then overthrown in 1979, bringing Khomeini to power
as the Supreme Leader. Our role in the later Iranian revolution isn't as
clear, yet. After that the 2009 Persian Awakening was additionally supported
by the states.

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dboreham
Fighting Persia goes back quite a way before 70 years ago...

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shittyadmin
What a joke, if companies in unrelated countries don't want to play by
sanctions, I see no reason to hold it against them. Unrelated states should
have no power over this. The amount of hate Huawei gets just for this from
otherwise reasonable people is rather excessive.

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lamarpye
So a company's business practices should supersede a country's laws. Does this
apply to only to sanctions? How about environmental laws?

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shittyadmin
This isn't a country's laws - Huawei is a Chinese company, it's not Chinese
prosecutors going after Huawei.

Companies should not be subject to the laws of arbitrary countries. Would you
say US copyright laws should be applied globally too?

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manfredo
Yes, copyright is a good analogy: I don't get to legally torrent non-American
works just because they're foreign. And if I did breach the copyright laws of
a country with which the US has no extradition treaty, I absolutely could be
persecuted if I travel to that country.

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stordoff
That's not quite the same because we recognise the copyright in domestic law.
American copyright laws aren't being directly applied in other countries -
different countries can have different laws on dealing with copyrighted
material.

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manfredo
Sure, but if you violate those laws and then travel to that country they're
completely allowed to persecute you. That's what happened to the Huawei exec
(or to be more specific, she traveled to a country with extradition treaties
with the US).

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jessaustin
Good job, warmongers. You've convinced me to buy Huawei. Maybe I can't do
anything to encourage our politicians and media to seek peace and prosperity
rather than war and kickbacks from armaments lobbyists. However, I can spend
$229 on a mobile phone that definitely doesn't have an _FBI_ backdoor
installed at the factory. Maybe that's enough for now?

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excalibur
Yeah, and ISIS has been fighting with American weapons for years. Hypocrisy
much?

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ASalazarMX
The stupid part is: Why is Iran forbidden from buying telecommunication
equipment? God forbid evil Iranians using using smartphones or the Internet.

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sjg007
The embargoes are to force regime change.

