The upcoming presidential election in the United States, whatever the outcome, is unlikely to change Washington's current stance of keeping Syria under economic sanctions, Bouthaina Shaaban, a political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad, told Sputnik in an interview
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 30th September, 2020) The upcoming presidential election in the United States, whatever the outcome, is unlikely to change Washington's current stance of keeping Syria under economic sanctions, Bouthaina Shaaban, a political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar Assad, told Sputnik in an interview.
The US is set to hold the presidential election on November 3. Incumbent President Donald Trump is running as the candidate of the Republican party, while former vice president Joe Biden is running as the Democratic candidate.
"I don't think that change of president is going to change much of the American decision [on the Syrian sanctions] because it is governed by lobbies which historically governed the United States," Shaaban said.
According to the politician, these lobbies in the US have proved capable of advancing their agenda regardless of whether a Republican or a Democrat president is at the helm, specifically with regard to Washington's actions in Syria and the Arab-Israeli conflict.
"Syria was subjected to American sanctions and punishment since 1979 and there were so many American administrations which came along, and we even went into a peace process for 10 years with American [backing] and they never lifted any of the sanctions they took against us," Shaaban argued.
Syria has been designated a State Sponsor of Terrorism by the US since December 1979 over Damascus' alleged support for various terrorist groups, including the facilitation of their transit to neighboring countries.
In 2004, a new round of sanctions was imposed on Damascus by Washington under its 2003 Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act. Atop of asset freezes and ban of commercial flights to and from Syria, the US froze all exports to the middle Eastern country, except for humanitarian aid. The US followed up with several more rounds of sanctions when the Syrian political disarray began in 2011, which would then escalate into a war that is still ongoing. The sanctions were imposed to deprive Assad's government of resources needed to resist militant opposition forces.
In 2020, the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act went into force in the US, targeting individuals or companies that cooperate financially with the Assad government. The Syrian Foreign Ministry said that the country and its people will resist all US sanctions as stubbornly as they have resisted terrorism.
