Date: 27 Jul 1999
Time: 08:43:24
Remote Name: 204.210.38.44
Tuesday, July 27, 1999; 6:30 a.m. EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sanctions against Iran, Libya and Sudan are being eased today to allow American companies to sell them food, medicine and medical equipment.
All three countries are listed by the State Department as exporters of terrorism and remain subject to military and business sanctions. It is embargoes that bar other dealings, including humanitarian aid, that are being eased.
``Sanctions on food, medicine and medical equipment do not generally advance our policy goals and may have adverse consequences in the humanitarian realm,'' Stuart Eizenstat, the deputy Treasury secretary, said Monday.
He said companies selling humanitarian goods would need licenses from the Treasury Department.
At the same time, the new policy offers U.S. companies, particularly farmers, an opportunity to boost exports. American farmers, feeling lingering effects of a global financial crisis, are suffering their worst economic period in a decade.
The new policy offers farmers the opportunity to sell more than 13 million tons of grain, worth as much as $2 billion, to Iran, Libya and Sudan, administration officials estimated.
Agricultural items permitted for export would include raw, processed and packaged foods, animal feeds, live food animals and seeds for food crops, Eizenstat said.
The regulations do not allow sale of nonfood agricultural commodities such as cotton or tobacco, he said.
The State Department first announced the intended policy change in April.
© Copyright 1999 The Associated Press