The Sanctions Age

Eva Dou on the rise of Chinese technology giant Huawei. 

Few companies better embody the promise and peril of China’s rise than Huawei. For nearly three decades, Huawei has steadily climbed towards the peak of the global telecommunications industry—first as a supplier of telecom infrastructure, then as a maker of smartphones, and more recently as a driving force behind Chinese ambitions in 5G, semiconductors, and artificial intelligence. Huawei’s ascent has also made it a prime target of U.S. sanctions, export controls, and political pressure. Since the early 2000s, Huawei has faced repeated confrontations with American economic power—from losing access to markets in Iraq and Iran, to getting shut out of 3G and 4G buildouts in the U.S. and Europe, to becoming a central focus of the Trump-era trade war with China. On this episode, we discuss Huawei with the reporter who knows the company best. 

Eva Dou is a tech policy reporter at The Washington Post. Prior to joining the Post, Eva spent seven years reporting on politics and technology for the Wall Street Journal in Beijing and Taipei. Earlier this year, she published House of Huawei, a deeply reported account of the rise of China’s most successful technology company and its enigmatic founder, Ren Zhengfei. House of Huawei has been Shortlisted for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Esfandyar Batmanghelidj on the "snapback" of sanctions in Iran. 

Last week, the host of The Sanctions Age, Esfandyar Batmanghelidj, was interviewed by Derek Davison for an episode of American Prestige, a podcast that takes a comprehensive look at American foreign policy and international affairs.

Derek and Esfandyar discussed the death of the Iran nuclear deal, which died last week after the triggering of the “snapback” mechanism and the reimposition of UN sanctions. They delved into Europe’s decision to pursue snapback and the factors that lead to the unravelling of the nuclear deal, including Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement, Biden’s hesitation to reenter it, and Iran’s deepening ties with Russia and China. Derek and Esfandyar also examined how the nuclear deal’s collapse represents a wider breakdown in the international order now underway.

Originally released as exclusive content for American Prestige subscribers, Derek has kindly allowed this conversation to be shared as a bonus episode of The Sanctions Age.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Gregory Brew on why oil sanctions no longer work. 

Few sanctions have been used as aggressively as oil sanctions. These measures are meant to hit oil producing “rogue states” where it hurts, starving governments of vital revenues and forcing changes in policy. But look around the world today and you will see a growing list of countries defying oil sanctions. Iran is still pumping. Russia is still exporting. Venezuela is still finding buyers. Oil sanctions were once thought to be the most powerful economic weapon in Washington’s arsenal. But Gregory Brew believes that “the age of oil sanctions as a coercive tool is coming to an end.”

On this episode, we unpack Greg’s argument, and along the way look at how countries like Iran and Russia are still pumping, shipping, and marketing oil for eager buyers. We discuss the networks that move this sanctioned crude, the central role that China plays in this trade, and we examine about a recent report into a shadowy oil broker called Ocean Glory that shows just how sophisticated sanctions evasion has become.

Greg is an analyst with Eurasia Group’s Energy, Climate & Resources team. He also serves as the group’s Iran country analyst. A historian by training, Greg is the author of two books on oil, Iran, and U.S. foreign policy.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj.

The show is produced by Spiritland Productions.

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The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Nicholas Trickett on how Russia approaches the fiscal pressure of sanctions. 

Russia is one of the world’s largest economies. It’s a top energy exporter and a major supplier of wheat, fertilizers, wood, and metals. Since the invasion of Ukraine, Western governments have tried to squeeze Russia’s revenues through unprecedented sanctions, price caps, and export controls. How Russia’s economy responds to war and sanctions doesn’t just matter for Moscow or Kyiv — it matters for the price of fuel in India, the cost of bread in Egypt, and the margins for factories in China.

Understanding what’s really going on in the Russian economy has become essential for anyone trying to design more painful sanctions or predict where global commodity prices are headed next. But what if our model of the Russian economy is fundamentally wrong?

Nicholas Trickett is a political economist and writer who has spent years analysing the Russian economy. When he is not working on his forthcoming book, Empire of Austerity, Nick is covering the global mining and metals industry as an Associate Director at S&P Global.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Jeff Stein on the impact of sanctions in a small Guatemalan town. 

The small Guatemalan town of El Estor was once a bustling mining hub, home to two major nickel mines that provided thousands of jobs and sustained the local government. In 2022, U.S. sanctions shuttered those mines almost overnight, triggering massive job losses, starving the town of public revenues, and collapsing small businesses. Families that had worked their way into the middle class were suddenly plunged into poverty, and many residents—facing few options—were forced to emigrate, setting out on the dangerous journey north to the United States.

Jeff Stein is the Washington Post’s chief economics correspondent. As part of a remarkable series of investigative stories called “The Money War,” Jeff reported from El Estor, bearing witness to the ways in which sanctions policies set in Washington can change the fortunes of communities thousands of miles away.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Karam Shaar on the legacy of sanctions in Syria. 

On December 8, 2024, Bashar Al-Assad fled Syria, bringing an end to the 13-year civil war that had devastated the country. Syrians who had endured years of conflict and deprivation, took to the streets in celebration. They were suddenly able to imagine a new future for their country. Assad’s fall caught the international community by surprise, and policymakers in the region, in Europe, and in the United States were forced to adjust their policies, opening lines of communication to Syria’s new leader, Ahmad Al-Shaara. Over the last six months, one issue has dominated the debate over Syria policy—lifting the Syria sanctions.

Karam Shaar is the founder of Karam Shaar Advisory, a consulting company. He currently serves as the Chief Economic Consultant to the Office of the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Syria and a Senior Consultant at the World Bank. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the New Lines Institute.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Erich Ferrari on the inner workings of OFAC. 

There is a powerful office in the Treasury Department called the Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC. You could argue that the officials in OFAC are the most powerful government functionaries in the world. They are the functionaries who sanction companies, organizations, and individuals, by adding these entities to a list called the Specially Designated Nationals List, or SDN List for short. 

Today, there are over 17,000 designated entities. The list includes Iranian government institutions, Afghan jihadists, Russian state enterprises, Venezuelan officials, and Mexican drug lords—a growing list of entities that the US deems a threat to national security. Getting on the list is easy. Getting off the list is hard.

Erich Ferrari is Founder and Principal Attorney of Ferrari & Associates, a Washington DC based law firm. Erich represents U.S. and foreign corporations, financial institutions, exporters, insurers, as well as private individuals in trade compliance, regulatory licensing matters, and federal investigations and prosecutions.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Golnar Motevalli on her experiences reporting from sanctioned Iran. 

Covering sanctions is complicated. Editors commissioning reports from countries like Iran, Russia, and Venezuela mainly want stories that focus on security or political issues, but on the ground, economic disruptions are what everyone is talking about. Foreign correspondents based in sanctioned countries are not just reporting on economic disruptions, they are experiencing them first-hand, contending with volatile markets, rising prices, product shortages, and a darkening mood. As economic pressure builds, journalism can become more sensitive. Government officials may not want the true extent of the economic fallout to become known.

This episode, recorded before the 12-day war fought between Israel and Iran in July, discusses the experience of foreign correspondents covering sanctions in Iran.

Golnar Motevalli is a reporter for Bloomberg. Between 2013 and 2020 she was a correspondent based in Tehran. Today, Golnar leads Bloomberg’s coverage on Iran from London.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Kyle Chan on Chinese innovation in the face of sanctions and export controls. 

Over the past several years, the United States has escalated its use of sanctions and export controls in the context of growing strategic competition with China. A central goal has been to contain China’s rise in high-tech industries—especially semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and clean energy—by cutting off access to advanced technology. This approach reflects a bipartisan consensus in Washington that restricting China’s access to innovation is key to preserving American technological dominance.

But there is an emerging debate about whether this approach is working as intended. Recent developments suggest that export controls and sanctions might be spurring faster innovation in China—forcing Chinese firms and the state to deepen their technological capabilities and reorganize industrial supply chains.

Kyle Chan is a postdoctoral researcher at Princeton University whose work focuses on industrial policy, innovation, and green technology in China. He is the author of an excellent newsletter titled High Capacity. He also recently published an op-ed in the New York Times on US-China technological competition.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj.

The show is produced by Spiritland Productions.

Sign up to The Sanctions Age newsletter:

www.thesanctionsage.com

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/

Francisco Rodríguez on the global death toll of sanctions. 

In the 1990s, UN sanctions imposed on Iraq led to a humanitarian crisis, with reports of a rapid increase in excess mortality, especially among children. In the early 2000s, policymakers responded to this crisis by vowing to use “smart sanctions” in the future, measures that would target elites while sparing civilians, thereby limiting the humanitarian harms of economic coercion. The perception that today’s sanctions are “smart” has contributed to the rapid increase in their use over the last two decades.

But a new paper, titled “Effects of International Sanctions on Age-Specific Mortality: A Cross-National Panel Data Analysis” and published in the prestigious journal The Lancet Global Health suggests that even today, sanctions continue to have devastating humanitarian impacts. Drawing on data from 152 countries over fifty years, the paper estimates that unilateral sanctions—particularly those imposed by the United States—are associated with over half a million excess deaths each year. The paper’s findings demand a fundamental reassessment of the humanitarian impacts of today’s sanctions regimes.

Francisco Rodríguez is the Rice Family Professor of the Practice at the Josef Korbel School at the University of Denver. Francisco is one of the co-authors of the paper, along with Silvio Rendón, and Mark Weisbrot.

The Sanctions Age is hosted by Esfandyar Batmanghelidj and Josefine Petrick.

To receive an email when new episodes are released, access episode transcripts, and read the hosts reflections on each episode, sign-up for the The Sanctions Age newsletter on Substack: https://www.thesanctionsage.com/