Dress it up however you like, the fact remains that countries can choose to not provide goods and services to whomever they want for whatever reason they want.
There's absolutely no moral obligation on an individual in any country to defy these laws and risk prison time - if they want change they can petition, vote and protest.
Beyond that the West is not responsible for any deaths caused by governments that refuse to cooperate with us (and therefore had sanctions placed on them) - that responsibility lies solely with the people and governments of sanctioned nations. We shouldn't be forced into supporting those who seek to destroy us based on HuMAnITaRiaN grounds.
The word "cooperate" carries a lot of weight in your reasoning. Could you give some examples?
One could also flip your argument and consider the many decades of US narcoterrorism, regime change operations and so on and the rather long line of failed states in its wake, and draw the conclusion that we ought to actually not submit to this 'world power' regardless of whether it 'dresses itself up' to be 'cooperative' while it engages in these activities or not.
For example, not respecting copyright laws (China), not participating in other sanctions (India), or intentionally destroying diplomatic relations (South Africa). It could also be more serious things like declarations of war, or long standing bad relations.
> One could also flip your argument and consider the many decades of US narcoterrorism
I'd agree with you here, I'm speaking purely of diplomatic / trade related activities (i.e. tariffs, sanctions, etc.) - imo putting boots on the ground or funding insurrections are an escalation that
1. no longer respects the autonomy of a country/people
2. are equivalent to military action
There's of course still a lot of grey-zones but hopefully it clarifies my position.
> we ought to actually not submit to this 'world power'
Again I agree, WE (as private citizens) ought not to, however diplomacy and trade are careful games played between larger entities (corporations, governments, etc.). But on the flip side it also doesn't mean we have to go against everything the government does (i.e. it isn't inherently evil).
The tricky line (as in this case) is when the actions of those entities can have an effect on you (the private citizen) like jail time.
China is a member of WIPO, so that's mostly something the US does to trample on the UN. Why should India change its policies around sanctions and start implementing them because the US thinks they should, instead of leveraging the UN sanctions system, which India adheres to? Same thing there. The US dislikes diplomacy and international institutions that treat states as equals, and prefers overtly or covertly hostile unilateral actions.
I'm not sure what you mean by the South Africa example.
I'm also not so sure it's a tricky line. Civil disobedience is something everyone should consider as a means of political action.
China's issue isn't so much the laws / treaties they've agreed to on paper. The issue more the actual implementation and enforcement of said rules.
> Why should India change its policies around sanctions and start implementing them
I'm not saying India has to, they're perfectly within their rights to ignore requests from the US, but neither does the US have to tolerate that (as they have been) - everyone is free to tariff / sanction as much as anyone else (not withstanding other agreements, but the same argument applies to those). In this way, everyone is free to pursue their own actions and ends. And as such, the US and India aren't forced to trade / cooperate outside of their own mutual benefit (i.e. if trade stops being beneficial to the US/India, they should stop).
This is how I mean each country is responsible for it's own outcomes, don't want to deal with the US? Fine. Just don't expect handouts and cooperation from US entities.
What I'm trying to express is that it's a 2 way street and both parties can walk along it as much as they want - and not a moral issue. I'm not saying there's no consequences, merely that it is OK for a country to pursue actions that (it believes) are in it's own favour.
> I'm not sure what you mean by the South Africa example
Completely fair, I've been diving into SA politics at the moment so it's just at the top of my mind. But there's been a long standing degradation in relations, to the point where recently the SA ambassador to the US was rejected by the US because of some very undiplomatic comments he refused to retract - followed by SA not replacing the ambassador for something like 6 months. Meaning there was no formal point of contact between the 2 countries, independent groups and non-ruling political parties tried to bridge the gap but there's only so much they could do. Another similar example is how while every other country tried to negotiate with Trump about his tariffs, SA refused (or forgot) to.
WIPO and it's relevant treaties provide a range of mechanisms for dispute resolution through diplomacy. The issue is that the US does not engage in diplomacy.
I think most scholars of international law would disagree on the legality of unilateral economic sanctions, since they are likely to amount to interventions and as such violate sovereignty, and, of course, human rights of the people affected. You also seem to think of US sanctions as if they were in a vacuum and not a preamble to aircraft carriers, narcoterrorism and other JSOC responsibilities, and possibly nuclear warheads, or less commonly, explicitly genocidal actions.
Right, so you meant that South Africa disagreeing with the ongoing genocide in Palestine in which the US is a main offender amounts to sabotage of diplomatic relations. As for refusing to "negotiate [...] about tariffs", why would anyone? If I punch you in the face, shoot a kid in the face, and then tell you to sit down by a table and negotiate how much you should pay me for that service, would you sit down and act as if I'm a reasonable, rational actor?
> The west is not responsible for any deaths caused by governments that refuse to cooperate with us
This US-centric mindset is so disgusting and emblematic of the narcissism of the west. The country has established itself as the most potent force for violence and economic abuse in the world.
You can easily take "the west" out of that sentence and replace it with any other country and it's still fair.
E.g. China sanctions a country then "China is not responsible for any deaths caused by governments that refuse to cooperate with them"
It's entirely the responsibility of each government to ensure the welfare of its own citizens. Anything more is purely goodwill. Anything less is treason.
You're just coping because the US/west is the predominant power.
My country should prioritize its own people first, second, third, fourth, fifth....and all other people a distant last, if at all. It sucks that the people in the US don't benefit as much as they could from being world hegemon, but that doesn't mean they would be better off if the US was in a lesser position in international relations.
There's absolutely no moral obligation on an individual in any country to defy these laws and risk prison time - if they want change they can petition, vote and protest.
Beyond that the West is not responsible for any deaths caused by governments that refuse to cooperate with us (and therefore had sanctions placed on them) - that responsibility lies solely with the people and governments of sanctioned nations. We shouldn't be forced into supporting those who seek to destroy us based on HuMAnITaRiaN grounds.