By Hadia Khan
In the world of international diplomacy, sanctions are often portrayed as the civilized alternative to war. They are the instruments of pressure that states deploy when diplomacy fails but the use of force seems too extreme. Supporters of sanctions argue that they help contain aggressors, protect civilians, and deter human rights violations without the devastating consequences of armed conflict. But as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk recently reminded the world, sanctions are not neutral tools. They can either serve the cause of justice or become instruments of collective punishment that devastate ordinary lives.
Speaking at the Biennial Panel on Unilateral Coercive Measures, Türk delivered a sobering reminder: sanctions must never be used to punish an entire population. His words are both timely and urgent. From the streets of Caracas to the villages of Afghanistan, the stories of ordinary people struggling under the weight of broad sanctions highlight a global truth—when sanctions ignore international law and humanitarian obligations, they erode human dignity instead of protecting it.
Sanctions occupy an uneasy space between law and politics. At their best, they are targeted measures imposed on individuals or entities responsible for corruption, atrocities, or threats to peace. These sanctions, when carefully designed, comply with international law and due process standards. They ensure that perpetrators face consequences while sparing civilians the unintended fallout. Such measures can freeze the assets of warlords, restrict the travel of arms dealers, or deny corrupt elites access to international financial systems. In doing so, they send a clear message that accountability cannot be evaded.
At their worst, however, sanctions expand into sweeping restrictions that target entire sectors of an economy. These are the sanctions that devastate supply chains, collapse currencies, and choke off access to basic necessities. Far from curbing the power of governments or armed actors, they shift the burden of suffering onto the shoulders of ordinary people. The line between lawful sanctions and unlawful coercion is therefore not abstract—it is measured in hunger, poverty, and preventable deaths.
The human costs of broad sanctions are impossible to ignore. Restrictions on banking systems often mean that humanitarian organizations cannot transfer money to field offices, delaying or halting relief efforts. Food supply chains break down when agricultural imports are restricted. Farmers cannot access fertilizers or spare parts for machinery. The price of bread doubles or triples, and families living at the margins are pushed into extreme hunger.In countries like Syria and Venezuela, sanctions on energy and finance have contributed to widespread shortages of medicine. Hospitals that once provided free or low-cost care now face empty shelves, outdated equipment, and frustrated medical staff unable to treat patients. In Afghanistan, where conflict has already displaced millions, sanctions on banking transactions have restricted humanitarian aid, leaving families without cash to buy food or fuel. The result is not the isolation of political elites but the punishment of women, children, and the elderly.Education, too, suffers under these measures. Schools facing shortages of basic supplies are unable to provide quality learning. Teachers lose salaries, students drop out, and a generation of young people is robbed of opportunities for growth. The rights to health, education, work, and social security—pillars of international human rights law—are gradually undermined by sanctions that claim to uphold justice.
Proponents of sanctions often argue that humanitarian exemptions are included to prevent harm to civilians. In theory, these exemptions guarantee that food, medicine, and other essentials can still flow into sanctioned countries. In practice, however, exemptions often fail. Banks, fearing legal liability or reputational damage, over-comply with restrictions, refusing to process transactions even for exempted goods. Humanitarian organizations find themselves trapped in bureaucratic labyrinths, spending months navigating licensing procedures while people in need go without aid.
The gap between law and implementation transforms exemptions into illusions. Türk’s call for clear, effective, and enforceable humanitarian exemptions is therefore more than a policy suggestion—it is a demand for accountability. Protecting humanitarian space is not an act of charity. It is an obligation under international human rights law.
Perhaps the most dangerous misuse of sanctions arises when they are employed to undermine accountability mechanisms. Türk emphasized that sanctions should never target international courts, UN experts, or other institutions tasked with delivering justice. Yet history shows that powerful states sometimes use sanctions precisely to silence dissenting voices or discredit independent investigations. This practice not only weakens the institutions designed to uphold the rule of law but also undermines global trust in the impartiality of justice itself.
Accountability mechanisms are fragile achievements of decades of international cooperation. If they are eroded by political retaliation, the victims of atrocities lose their last recourse for justice, and perpetrators are emboldened by the knowledge that global scrutiny can be deflected through coercion. Protecting these mechanisms is therefore essential to the integrity of international human rights.
The question, then, is not whether sanctions should exist but how they should be designed. For sanctions to retain legitimacy, they must be:
● Compliant with international law, including human rights obligations.
● Targeted and proportionate, aimed specifically at perpetrators rather than populations.
● Accompanied by operational humanitarian exemptions that truly function in practice.
● Regularly reviewed and monitored to assess their impact on human rights.Above all, sanctions must be understood not merely as tools of diplomacy but as moral choices.
Every restriction carries consequences measured in human suffering. Each blocked shipment of medicine, each delayed humanitarian transfer, translates into lives at risk. As conflicts proliferate—from Ukraine to Sudan, from Yemen to Myanmar—the international community must confront an uncomfortable reality: the careless design of sanctions can transform them into weapons as deadly as bombs, only quieter.
Sanctions are too often viewed in the cold language of policy papers and diplomatic communiqués. But behind every embargo and restriction are human stories—mothers skipping meals so their children can eat, patients dying for lack of treatment, children forced to abandon schools. These are not collateral damages; they are violations of human rights that international law exists to prevent.
Volker Türk’s warning is not just a legal caution but a moral imperative. If the world wishes to remain faithful to the principles of dignity and justice, sanctions must never be reduced to blunt instruments of geopolitical rivalry. They must be crafted carefully, implemented fairly, and constantly evaluated for their human impact. To ignore this is to risk turning tools of justice into engines of despair.
The challenge before us is clear: to build a sanctions regime that pressures perpetrators without punishing victims, that upholds peace without undermining rights, and that affirms the inherent dignity of every human being. Anything less would be a betrayal of the very values the international community claims to defend.
About the Author
Hadia Khan is a law candidate at the University of London and Senior Partner for International Affairs at Pacta Lexis. Her work focuses on alternative dispute resolution, mediation advocacy, human rights, migration, peacebuilding, and climate action.
