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Economic Sanctions
Domestic restrictions or penalties imposed on international trade from one country to another primarily for political reasons. Generally, such sanctions are placed for purposes of foreign policy or national security. Economic sanctions have historically included trade barriers, import duties, tariffs, and export duties.
Economic sanctions have been in use for two millennia, tracing back to 432 BCE, when officials in Athens denied traders from the state of Megara access to Athens's harbor and its marketplace. Thousands of years later, the imposition of sanctions has become one of the major tools of international governance. Between the years 1945 and 1990, the United Nations (UN) Security Council, authorized under Article 16 of the UN Charter to use economic restrictions to address “threats of aggression” and “breaches of peace,” ...