August 12 is the 75th anniversary of the Fourth Geneva Convention and its prohibition on collective punishment and dozens of legal experts and human rights activists and organizations have signed an open letter to president Biden calling for the US "to comply with international law by ending the use of broad, unilateral coercive measures that extensively harm civilian populations."
The letter notes that:
One key provision, found in Geneva Convention (IV) relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, is the prohibition of collective punishment, which is considered a war crime. We consider the unilateral application of certain economic sanctions to constitute collective punishment.
Collective punishment is a standard practice of US foreign policy today in the form of broad, unilateral economic and financial sanctions. While other countries apply sanctions in some form, the United States imposes more unilateral economic sanctions than any other country in the world, by far. Though this method of collective punishment may differ from that of conventional warfare, and is often applied outside of declared military conflict, its collective impact on civilians can be just as indiscriminate, punitive, and deadly.
It states further:
Hundreds of millions of people currently live under such broad US economic sanctions in some form, including in notable cases such as Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Venezuela. The evidence that these measures can cause severe, widespread civilian harm, including death, is overwhelming Broad economic sanctions can spark and prolong economic crises, hinder access to essential goods like food, fuel, and medicine, and increase poverty, hunger, disease, and even death rates, especially among children. Such conditions in turn often drive mass migration, as in the recent cases of Cuba and Venezuela.
Civilian suffering is not merely an incidental cost of these policies, but often their very intent.
Full letter and signatories:
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