With the Obama Administration still crowing about its claims to have gotten support for some level of new sanctions against the Iranian government, former Secretary of State Colin Powell says he doesn’t believe they will accomplish anything.
“I don’t see that this causes sufficient pain,” Powell insisted, though he did not suggest that an alternative littany of sanctions would convince Iran to abandon its civilian nuclear program either.
“Iranians have been around for thousands of years, trading and selling and getting around various constraints and what not, they’re very clever,” Powell added.
The new sanctions are said to target banks and shipping in an effort to punish the nation for refusing to stop enriching uranium for civilian purposes and for continuing with its plans to open a nuclear power plant. Iranian opposition figure Mir-Hossein Moussavi warned that the sanctions were likely to harm civilians while doing little to change government policy.
