US Sanctions, World’s Inaction Ruining Sustainable Development Goals

An Iranian envoy to the United Nations said the US government’s illegitimate, unilateral coercive measures, including the sanctions, coupled with the international community’s idleness have turned the pivotal ideal of sustainable development into an absurd and meaningless claim.
Addressing a High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in New York, the first counselor of the Iran’s permanent mission to the UN, Ali Hajilari, denounced the obstruction of achievement of the sustainable development caused by the US policies, IRNA reported.
“The illegal unilateral coercive measures imposed by the US and the passivity of the international community toward it, have turned the development into a decorative and absurd slogan,” he said.
“The US illegitimate, unilateral coercive measures, including the imposition of illegal unilateral sanctions on developing countries, on the one hand, and the international community’s inaction towards that, on the other hand, have turned the pivotal ideal of sustainable development, namely ‘no one should be left behind’, into a purely decorative, absurd and meaningless claim,” the Iranian diplomat added.
Hajilari noted that this slogan is the backbone and the “DNA” of development, and without its realization, any effort or plan to promote development in developing countries is more like “a bitter joke”.
The Iranian diplomat also called for immediate and effective action by the international community to end the illegal and illegitimate sanctions against developing countries.
“The right to development, as an inalienable human right, will not be achievable while multilateralism is under increasing pressure and the unilateral measures taken by a small number of countries endangers the foundations of international cooperation,” he warned.