The document summarizes an article from German-Foreign-Policy.com about Donald Trump threatening war crimes against Iran by destroying cultural sites, and threatening Iraq with sanctions if they demand withdrawal of foreign troops. It notes that the German government has remained silent about Trump's threats. It provides context about the devastating impact of sanctions against Iraq in the 1990s, which according to UNICEF led to the deaths of half a million children.

1. This is a translation of an article from German-Foreign-Policy.com on Donald Trump's threats
of imposing new sanctions on Iraq for demanding the withdrawal of all foreign military forces
and razing Iran's cultural monuments. The article also mentions the German government's
decision to go along with the Trump administration on these matters and the consequences of
sanctions on Iraq during the 1990s. The original article is here: https://www.german-foreign-
policy.com/news/detail/8146/
German-Foreign-Policy.com is somewhat comparable to the North American Congress on Latin
America (NACLA; https://nacla.org/ ) and the Middle East Research and Information Project
(MERIP; https://merip.org/).
The translation follows and all errors are mine.
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Destroyers of culture: The President of the United States threatens war crimes. The German
federal government is silent as it postpones the withdrawal of its military from Iraq
German-Foreign-Policy.com
Source link: https://www.german-foreign-policy.com/news/detail/8146/
Washington, D.C./Tehran/Berlin (original report dated Tuesday, January 7, 2020)—The
German federal government is silent about U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to commit war
crimes in Iran. Trump has determined, in the event of an Iranian counterattack, to destroy targets
which are “significant” for “Iranian culture”. The human rights conventions of 1954 and 1977
expressly forbid this. The German government takes the threat of one of its closest military allies
without any drama. Likewise, it refuses to come to a decision with the Iraqi parliament to
withdraw foreign troops from [Iraq]. There was a denial of reports dated [Monday, January 6,
2020] indicating that the U.S. could be ready to withdraw. The U.S. President has placed before
Iraq this scenario: Should Baghdad continue to insist upon withdrawal [of foreign troops], then it
will undergo the most brutal sanctions in sight. Iraq was already subject to sanctions during the
1990s. According to UNICEF, those sanctions led to the deaths of a half-million children. The
U.S. foreign minister at the time, Madeleine Albright, said of the sanctions: "We think the price
is worth it." (Albright’s official title from 1993 to 1996 was U.S. Ambassador to the United
Nations. From 1997 to 2001, Albright was the U.S. Secretary of State)
War crimes
After the murders of Qassem Soleimani and other Iranian and Iraqi military personnel, U.S.
President Donald Trump is threatening more war crimes. According to a leading German
government adviser, these murders fit the definition of “state terrorism” [1]. Now, Trump in his
Twitter statements has expressly threatened the destruction of targets in Iran that are
“significant” for “Iranian culture”. The targeted destruction of important cultural assets is
forbidden on human rights grounds as per the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural
Property in the Event of Armed Conflict (1954) and the Geneva Convention’s supplementary
protocol (1977). On March 24, 2017, the United Nations Security Council agreed on a resolution

2. that decisively condemned the “unlawful destruction of cultural heritage”, “especially by terrorist
groups” [2]. Concerning the deliberate destruction of historical cultural assets, the International
Criminal Court, for the first time in September 2016, handed down a sentence—for the
destruction of a traditional mausoleum in Timbuktu, a Malian received a nine-year prison
sentence [3].
Berlin stays silent
The German government remains silent about the matter. It is clearly against Iran’s measures.
Foreign minister Heiko Maas explained as much after the Iranian regime’s announcement that it
would first accept the limitations of the nuclear agreement and then again within full scope
should all other parties to the agreement abide by their responsibilities: “That is what Iran now
calls for. We could not merely accept it with nonchalance” [4]. Indeed, the German government
not only nonchalantly accepted the U.S. President’s statement but also was willing to go along
with war crimes such as the destruction of Iranian cultural property should Iran counterattack.
Already, Berlin does not classify the murders of Soleimani and other high-ranking military
personnel as crimes against human rights. The German government only directs charges of
human rights violations while in conflict against opposing states.
With sanctions threatened
The future of the German military mission in Iraq remains unclear. As a spokesperson for the
German defense ministry confirmed yesterday [, Monday, January 6, 2020], the German
government has not followed the Iraqi parliament’s resolution from Sunday [, January 5,
2020]—parliamentary members called for the withdrawal of all foreign troops. The speaker
revealed that, in all circumstances, one will accept the “decision(s) of the Iraqi government” [5].
In fact, not only Berlin but also Washington, D.C., today works to prevent such decision-making.
President Trump threatened tough sanctions should the [Iraqi] government in Baghdad decide to
go with the parliamentary resolution and, likewise, call for the exit of foreign troops. The U.S.
president declared: “If they ask us to leave the country, then we will place sanctions the like of
which they have not experienced before. The sanctions against Iran will look tame in
comparison” [6].
Sanctions with deadly consequences
In fact, Iraq has had years-long experience with Western-initiated sanctions with, at least up to
now, more serious consequences than the U.S. embargo against Iran, which has been
extraterritorially executed and is thus in violation of human rights. The sanctions against Iran has
led the country’s economic output to already fall off by 4.8 percent in 2018 and by a further
9.5% in 2019. Similarly, living expenses in Iran have sharply risen. For example, by late October
2019, foodstuffs became 61% more expensive than in the previous year [7]. Due to the sanctions,
numerous products are neither importable nor can be manufactured in Iran. In the latter case, the
necessary raw materials are not available in the country and, likewise, cannot be purchased
abroad. This holds, not least, for medications. As a current study from Human Rights Watch, a
human rights organization, indicates, severe illnesses are often not treated appropriately. What is
lacking are anti-epilepsy medications, thus exposing those afflicted to great(er) risks, and means

3. for fighting leukemia, thus clearly diminishing opportunities to recover from sickness [8].
Therefore, the sanctions on Iran have cost countless human lives.
A half-million children
This was also the case with the sanctions imposed on Iraq in 1990. These sanctions led to, among
other things, per capita calorie intake falling from around 3,120 a day in 1989 to 1,093 a day in
1995. By the end of the 1980s, 97% of urban and 78% of rural populations had access to free-of-
charge healthcare. Due to the sanctions, the healthcare budget became reduced to 10% of its
former amount—the shortage of medications and spare parts for medical equipment led to the
collapse of the healthcare system. The disintegration of drinking water supplies contributed to
new outbreaks of diseases such as cholera. The ruin of veterinary medicine paved the way for the
spread of epidemics and serious harm for livestock breeding [9]. According to a UNICEF
investigation, the infant mortality rate more than doubled during the 1990s. Carol Bellamy, the
then-director of UNICEF, confirmed in 1999: “Had the significant decline in the infant mortality
rate during the 1980s continued into the 1990s, there would have been an overall half-million
fewer recorded cases of death in the eight (8) years from 1991 to 1998 among children below
five (5) years of age” [10]. Asked as to whether the sanctions’ political impact was worth the
deaths of a half-million children, the then-U.S. foreign minister Madeline Albright declared in a
television broadcast: "We think the price is worth it" [11].
Déjà vu
The U.S. President’s threat of sanctions concerns, in Iraq, a population in which the majority is
well above twenty-five (25) years of age and still have personal memories of the sanctions and
their deadly consequences. In contrast, those who have mostly forgotten about [those
consequences] are where they have designed [the sanctions] in the first place: in the West.
Footnotes with italicized translations from the original:
[1] "Asymmetrischer Krieg hat schon begonnen"(Asymmetric warfare has already begun).
tagesschau.de 03.01.2020. S. dazu Ein Mord und die Folgen (A murder and its consequences).
[2] United Nations Security Council: S/RES/2347 (2017). un.org 24.03.2017.
[3] Jason Burke: ICC ruling for Timbuktu destruction "should be deterrent for others".
theguardian.com 27.09.2016.
[4] Merkel trifft sich mit Putin (Merkel meets with Putin). spiegel.de 06.01.2020.
[5] Bundeswehr bereitet sich auf Rückzug aus dem Irak vor (German military prepares for
withdrawal from Iraq). welt.de 06.02.2020.
[6] Maggie Haberman: Trump Threatens Iranian Cultural Sites, and Warns of Sanctions on Iraq.
nytimes.com 05.01.2020.
[7] Six charts that show how hard US sanctions have hit Iran. bbc.co.uk 09.12.2019.
[8] Human Rights Watch: "Maximum Pressure". US Economic Sanctions Harm Iranians' Right
to Health. hrw.org October 2019.

4. [9], [10] Joachim Guilliard: Humanitäre Hilferufe. Untersuchungsberichte von UN- und anderen
Hilfsorganisationen über die Auswirkungen des Embargos (Cries for Humanitarian Aid:
Investigative Report by UN- and Other Aid Organizations on the Effects of the Embargo). In:
Rüdiger Göbel, Joachim Guilliard, Michael Schiffmann: Der Irak. Ein belagertes Land (Iraq: A
Besieged Country). Köln 2001. S. 190-196.
[11] Zitiert nach: Ramsey Clark: Feuer und Eis. Die Zerstörung des Irak durch Krieg und
Sanktionen (Quoted in: Ramsey Clark: Fire and Ice: Iraq’s Destruction through War and
Sanctions). In: Rüdiger Göbel, Joachim Guilliard, Michael Schiffmann: Der Irak. Ein belagertes
Land (Iraq: A Besieged Country). Köln 2001. S. 32-66.