2003: Trade Between China and Iran Soars

Trade between China and Iran increases by 50 percent. China is a major exporter of manufactured goods to Iran, including computer systems, household appliances, and automobiles. The growth of Chinese-Iranian trade has undermined the effectiveness of US sanctions against companies doing business with Iran, which the Bush administration claims is pursuing the development of nuclear weapons and has ties to terrorist organizations. “Sanctions are not effective nowadays because we have many options in secondary markets, like China,” Hossein Shariatmadari, a leading conservative Iranian theorist and editor of the Kayhan newspapers, will tell the Washington Post in 2005. [Washington Post, 11/17/2004]