


































Economics, Law and Policy 
ISSN 2576-2060 (Print) ISSN 2576-2052 (Online) 

Vol. 7, No. 3, 2024 

www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elp 

15 
 

Original Paper 

Our Exploration of Countermeasures against the Abuse of 

Unilateral Sanctions by the United States 

Zhao Jiahui
1
 

1
 Shenyang University of Technology, Shenyang City, Liaoning Province, China 

 

Received: October 8, 2024    Accepted: October 15, 2024    Online Published: October 16, 2024 

doi:10.22158/elp.v7n3p15              URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.22158/elp.v7n3p15 

 

Abstract 

Currently, the international landscape is undergoing changes, with unilateralism on the rise. Of which, 

economic sanctions are the most common form. Due to the lack of effective specialized international 

rules in the current international rule system, unilateral sanctions are increasingly frequently used by 

individual countries. The abuse of unilateral sanctions has impacted the normal operation of 

international mechanisms. Unilateral sanctions were originally used in a country’s domestic law, but 

now some countries, such as the United States, expand their own laws’ extraterritorial application 

through the continuous expansion of connection points, thereby giving their sanctions against foreign 

entities a cloak of legitimacy, which goes against the principles of international law and the basic 

norms of international relations (Bai, 2018). From a legal perspective, the implementation of illegal 

unilateral sanctions is achieved through the improper interpretation and application of international 

treaty exception clauses. From international custom, unilateral sanctions beyond countermeasures 

refer to those imposed by states other than the injured state, who deliberately legalize countermeasures 

related to sanctions, which greatly contributes to the abuse of unilateral sanctions. In this context, 

China should accelerate the construction of its anti-sanctions legal system to effectively counter the 

threats and damages caused by unilateral sanctions and firmly safeguard its sovereignty, security, and 

development interests. 

Keywords 

unilateral sanctions, countermeasures, security exception, anti-measures 

 

In recent years, unilateral sanctions outside the scope permitted by the United Nations have gradually 

increased. The United States and the European Union are the main countries that have imposed 

unilateral sanctions. Unilateral sanctions like these, which have not been confirmed by the United 

Nations, are generally familiar to us. Since unilateral sanctions are not controlled and confirmed by 



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the United Nations, they are further used more frequently. Such coercive measures have a great impact 

on the existing rules of international law and on the sovereignty of States. 

 

1. Introduction 

The main reason why unilateral sanctions are abused as a tool to achieve political goals between 

countries is that their definition is too vague and legal regulations are insufficient. Unilateral sanctions 

are illegal in most cases, so it becomes urgent and important to analyze their illegality. Based on the 

analysis of the concept and illegality of unilateral sanctions, this paper will put forward reasonable 

suggestions for our country to deal with unilateral sanctions. 

1.1 Unilateral and Secondary Sanctions 

Unilateral sanctions are when a subject of international law “unilaterally” decides to impose economic, 

trade or other coercive measures on the target of sanctions in order to force the target of sanctions to 

change its policies or actions. Unilateral sanctions are designed to force other countries to act in line 

with their own national interests, so as to achieve their own national interests. This is contrary to the 

principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries in international law.  

In the case of unilateral sanctions, it is divided into primary sanctions and secondary sanctions, and the 

main content of primary sanctions is to prohibit or relatively restrict the transactions or other exchanges 

between one’s own country and the sanctioned country. In addition to the above content, secondary 

sanctions also prohibit and restrict transactions between third countries and their own countries related 

to the sanctioned countries. In the current international community environment, we have no objection 

to the view that secondary sanctions are contrary to international principles and norms. 

Secondary sanctions are embodied in the fact that a country extends its domestic law without any 

measure or concern to achieve the purpose of interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, which 

definitely violates the principle of non-interference and the principle of state sovereignty in 

international law. Secondary sanctions and extraterritorial application of laws have largely created legal 

inequalities among countries, which run counter to the principles of respecting national sovereignty and 

non-interference in other countries’ internal affairs that we have always followed. 

 

2. Second, the Reasons Why Unilateral Sanctions Are Abused 

2.1 The Vague Definition of Unilateral Sanctions Has Led to Their Abuse 

Most of the unilateral sanctions in today’s international community do not conform to the sanctions 

referred to in the international law. Unilateral sanctions are mainly economic sanctions. Some scholars 

of international law even define unilateral sanctions only from an economic perspective, and some even 

equate unilateral sanctions with economic sanctions. This is confused with economic sanctions. 

However, as we all know, unilateral sanctions are divided into economic sanctions and non-economic 

sanctions, and economic sanctions often have political purposes. Some experts and scholars try to 

define unilateral sanctions from multilateral sanctions, but there are different views on the definition of 



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multilateral sanctions in the world. Although the UN Charter provides an international framework for 

the use of economic sanctions, most countries impose economic sanctions on a unilateral basis based 

on national legislation. A few countries have expanded the interpretation and application of unilateral 

economic sanctions based on their own core interests, leading to the excessive use of unilateral 

economic sanctions. 

At present, the international community still lacks a universal and authoritative definition of unilateral 

sanctions, and the applicable rules of unilateral sanctions are also inadvertently clear, resulting in the 

abuse of unilateral sanctions. 

2.2 The Complexity of the Characterization of Unilateral Sanctions Makes It Difficult to Apply the Law 

Unilateral sanctions can only be considered when the legal nature of the sanctions is determined. In 

international law, unilateral sanctions are generally referred to as counter-reporting and 

countermeasures, but the specific type of sanctions should be analyzed according to the specific 

situation. In practice, however, determining the nature of the law is an extremely difficult matter. The 

reasons mainly include two aspects, one is that there is no recognized international court or other 

institution with compulsory jurisdiction that can exercise jurisdiction. On the other hand, in recent 

years, in addition to the resolutions of the UN Security Council, many countries or regions have 

implemented more and more unilateral sanctions. And they all have some common points, such as the 

gradual strengthening of extraterritorial, through some extraterritorial sanctions to impose their own 

laws on other countries and regions; The means of unilateral sanctions are gradually increasing, from 

the single economic sanctions to the parallel economic sanctions, cultural sanctions and political 

sanctions, and the proportion of political sanctions is increasing. 

In fact, whatever the underlying reasons, the legal character of unilateral sanctions is determined 

primarily by the measures taken by the acting State and can therefore vary. In practice, unilateral 

measures can not only include economic measures such as financial sanctions, asset freezes, trade 

sanctions, arms embargoes, and commodity embargoes. It can also include non-economic measures 

such as diplomatic sanctions, travel bans, restrictions on freedom of navigation, aviation and transit, 

and the right to communication [Analysis of the illegality of unilateral sanctions and legal responses. 

Politics and Law. Zhang Yue (Law School, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610207, China)]. Among 

them, embargoes, diplomatic sanctions and travel bans may not be unlawful in themselves or in 

response to wrongful acts and can generally be characterized as counter-reporting under international 

law. How to distinguish low-intensity unilateral sanctions with retaliatory nature from purely 

high-intensity unilateral sanctions is a difficult problem in practice. 

2.3 The Use of Counter-Sanctions beyond the Limit Opens Up the Possibility of Unilateral Sanctions 

Sanctions are a means of punishment related to the responsibility of the State and are in fact a response 

to international wrongful acts. In the absence of a corresponding treaty and the absence of a Security 

Council resolution, the use of international custom to provide the so-called legal basis for unilateral 

sanctions would remove the wrongfulness of the corresponding act of countermeasures. In the past, 



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countries or regions that initiated unilateral sanctions first used countermeasures as an excuse to cover 

up their real acts of unilateral sanctions. However, the current anti-sanctions regulations are not perfect, 

which leads to the lack of certainty in the process of application. For example, in certain cases, 

measures such as counter-sanctions are applied without the consent or even knowledge of the targeted 

State, or even without the certainty that the illegal act has actually taken place. 

The first condition for becoming a counter-sanctions measure in accordance with international law is 

not to violate procedural provisions. There are many procedural provisions, the first thing to pay 

attention to is to inform the other side of the obligation to counter sanctions and to propose that we 

should negotiate with the other side on the matter of sanctions. If the steps and procedures mentioned 

above are missing, it is also essentially a violation of the substance, because there is no difference in 

the result. That would lead to the illegality of what is itself characterized as unilateral sanctions 

remaining, and it would lead to the creation of State responsibility. In this case, if the sanctioned party 

implements relevant actions and measures to counter the situation it is facing, it is easy to escalate the 

situation. 

Corresponding to the procedural requirement is the substantive requirement, that is, the root cause of 

unilateral sanctions, that is, whether the country facing the sanctions has committed a real act that is not 

in line with international law. Article 49 of the Draft states: “An injured State may, inter alia, only take 

countermeasures against the State responsible for the internationally wrongful act in order to induce 

that State to comply with its obligations” (Wang, 2022). The question of this first response is whether 

the State imposing countermeasures is actually in violation of international law. Take the United States 

and Russia for example. The United States and the European Union say that they imposed unilateral 

sanctions on Russia before it committed numerous violations of international law. The United States 

and the European Union have portrayed their unilateral sanctions as justified and a response to Russia’s 

previous wrongdoing. 

 

3. The Adverse Effects of Unilateral Sanctions on Our Country 

3.1 National Sovereignty Has Been Seriously Violated 

The Charter of the United Nations provides for the principles of sovereign equality of States and 

non-interference in the internal affairs of states. These principles are applicable and must be observed 

by all countries and regions, and they have a mandatory effect. However, in recent years, unilateral 

sanctions imposed by western countries represented by the United States have seriously infringed our 

national sovereignty. In this case, the United States forced some enterprises to give up free trade with 

China’s Xinjiang cotton on the absurd grounds of forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region, in order to 

destroy China’s cotton industry base, destroy China’s cotton textile industry, and destroy the stable 

employment situation in Xinjiang. After a rigorous review of the Xinjiang project by the Shanghai 

Representative Office, it was reported to headquarters that it had not found a single case of forced labor 

in China. But the findings continue to be ignored. The United States forced some enterprises to give up 



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cooperation with Xinjiang cotton by withholding order, which is to apply its domestic law to China’s 

free trade with Xinjiang and related enterprises. This behavior seriously violates the principle of 

non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries stipulated in the UN Charter, and also 

infringes on China’s interests to a large extent, and is illegal. 

The United States has also repeatedly interfered in our internal affairs and harmed our interests through 

secondary sanctions. In 2018, the United States indicted and extradited Meng. Under a series of tricks 

by the United States, Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of Huawei, was detained by the 

Canadian side when she was transferring through Italy, and Meng Wanzhou was detained without 

violating Canadian laws, which is very unreasonable. The American case against Meng is fraud, but it 

is a false one. The United States and Canada have always used extradition treaties as a FIG leaf for 

their persecution of Chinese citizens, but it is internationally recognized that the law they rely on is 

only a means to protect their own interests and persecutory citizens of other countries, and has nothing 

to do with their stated fairness. Judging from the past events, the intention of the Meng Wanzhou 

incident is to suppress Chinese citizens, but also to suppress China’s high-tech development. It can be 

seen from the Meng Wanzhou incident that Western countries represented by the United States use 

their international influence and their own economic advantages to force trade between third countries 

and the sanctioned countries. This is contrary to the internationally recognized principle of respect for 

the sovereignty of other states. 

3.2 The Development of High-Tech Fields Is Limited 

Western countries represented by the United States have for a long time occupied the leading level of 

scientific and technological development in the world, as well as their own import and export related 

laws and regulations such as the Export Administration Regulations. At the same time, with the 

specific measures such as the “entity list” and “Section 301” formulated by them, the development of 

China’s high-tech technology field is restricted, and the targets of sanctions are Huawei and DJI, which 

are high-tech centered enterprises, in order to curb the development of China’s high-tech enterprises, so 

as to achieve the purpose of maintaining their own national science and technology hegemony. 

The “clean network” program is essentially the United States’ suppression of the technological 

development of China’s high-tech fields. Taking advantage of its leading edge in science and 

technology, especially the Internet, the United States has been doing all kinds of activities to monitor 

other countries’ governments or individuals, but now it attacks China without evidence and claims to 

“clean the Internet”. This insolence is no longer merely a matter of turning black and white upside 

down and distorting facts. The plan is a comprehensive form of discrimination and infringement 

against specific industries and sectors, targeting China. It goes beyond the punishment of a single 

enterprise or individual, and is a crackdown on a country’s enterprise groups and the entire industry 

involved in Internet and telecommunications services. This is a direct violation of the company’s right 

to normal business as well as its legitimate rights and interests under domestic and international law. 

The scope of the hegemonic acts of the United States and the seriousness of the illegal situation should 



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arouse the great attention of the entire international community, including China. 

3.3 The Legitimate Rights and Interests of Enterprises Cannot Be Protected 

In recent years, in the process of unilateral sanctions carried out by countries represented by the United 

States, quite a number of Chinese enterprises often choose the way of punishment to end quickly in 

order to avoid themselves falling into public opinion and to avoid the adverse effects brought by 

transnational lawsuits. In the actual process, enterprises often face a long-term investigation, which will 

lead to a decline in the reputation of the enterprise, but also let the enterprise in the panic for a long 

time, so enterprises in order to get out of this predicament as soon as possible, often choose to 

compromise. However, this approach often leads to heavy losses for the enterprise, and this loss is not 

what the enterprise should bear. 

In March 2017, ZTE and the US government reached a settlement in the export control investigation 

case, ZTE paid about US $890 million in criminal and civil penalties, and the US Department of 

Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security suspended a US $300 million fine against ZTE, which 

will be paid based on ZTE’s compliance with the agreement over the next seven years. It was the 

largest fine ever imposed on a Chinese company. However, on April 16, 2018, the website of the US 

Department of Commerce announced that the United States and ZTE companies should not have trade 

exchanges for seven years. The reason given by the United States is that ZTE has violated the 

settlement agreement signed by the two sides. The US accused ZTE of illegally exporting to Iran and 

North Korea. However, because ZTE had previously been forced to settle with the United States under 

pressure from all parties, the case did not enter judicial proceedings, which means that ZTE has given 

up the opportunity to protect its rights and interests by judicial proceedings. At the same time, the 

amount of fines stipulated in the unequal settlement agreement between ZTE and the United States 

caused ZTE to suffer greatly in the year after the payment of the fine, and various profit indicators 

turned negative, before which ZTE’s profitability had been stable. 

3.4 The International Order Has Suffered a Major Setback 

In order to safeguard its own national interests and consolidate its hegemonic position, the United 

States has extended its domestic laws to other countries many times, which has not only seriously 

damaged the interests of other countries, but also seriously damaged the international order that has 

been jointly maintained by all countries for a long time. To prevent Iran from developing nuclear 

weapons, the United States has banned all companies from importing Iranian oil. In September 2019, 

the US Treasury Department announced sanctions against six Chinese companies and five Chinese 

citizens for “knowingly transferring oil from Iran in violation of Washington’s sanctions against Iran”, 

including freezing the assets and earnings of these entities in the United States. U.S. companies and 

citizens are prohibited from making payments and any transfer of U.S. assets with those sanctioned 

entities. Such behavior of the United States completely ignores the position of the United Nations and 

the interests of other countries, and is a challenge to and serious disturbance to the international order. 

 



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4. The Specific Path of China’s Response to the Unilateral Sanctions of the United States Is 

Applicable 

At present, in the face of many serious unilateral sanctions by the United States, China has responded 

from the aspects of legislation, encouraging enterprises to respond reasonably and positively, and 

regional cooperation with other countries and regions, which has largely reduced the adverse impact of 

unilateral sanctions brought by the United States, and is also an encouragement for Chinese entities (Li, 

2022). Maintaining the international order is the responsibility and obligation of China as a major 

country, and it is reasonable to further improve the response path to the unilateral sanctions of the 

United States on the premise of abiding by international law. 

4.1 We Will Accelerate the Establishment of an Anti-Sanctions Legal System 

The formulation and implementation of anti-sanctions measures in accordance with the law can not 

only help our enterprises facing unreasonable unilateral sanctions to solve the dilemma, but also have a 

positive impact on maintaining the image of our country as a responsible major country and enhancing 

our international influence. In view of unilateral sanctions, China currently has the Anti-Foreign 

Sanctions Law, which can be used in some specific circumstances. From the perspective of 

international law, the sanctions measures that can be used in our law are basically anti-sanctions 

measures, which means that only when a country becomes a sanctioned country can apply the law to 

respond, and can not take the initiative to apply to protect its own rights and interests. 

At present, the document “Blocking Measures” that can be applied to anti-sanctions is issued by the 

Ministry of Commerce of The State Council of China, which is a category of departmental rules. 

Compared with laws or administrative regulations, its legal effect is low, which results in that 

departmental rules can not play a very good role in restraining the situation that requires 

multi-department cooperation in the process of anti-sanctions. In many other countries, 

anti-sanctions-related measures are in the form of formal laws. 

On the other hand, the structure of anti-sanctions should be further improved, and special anti-sanctions 

agencies should be set up to avoid shirking responsibilities among various departments or overlapping 

responsibilities. 

4.2 Further Clarify the Scope of Counter-Sanctions 

At present, the scope of China’s anti-sanctions is mainly stipulated by the Anti-sanction Law and the 

unreliable entity system, which lacks obvious predictability. At the same time, the scope of 

anti-sanctions is too large and unclear, and it is difficult to determine in the actual process, which has a 

lot of adverse effects on the real economy. Therefore, we should pay more attention to the 

implementability of measures in the path of improving anti-sanctions, and the criteria for the list should 

be further clarified. 

The first thing to do is to clarify the objective criteria for entry into the list, and the List has clear 

provisions explaining the consideration of the list of unreliable entities, mainly including the 

commercial purpose, the foreseeable degree of harm to our entity enterprises and the actual degree of 



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damage ultimately caused. Considering the impact on China’s entity enterprises, it should be as much 

as possible to reduce its unpredictability, so that China’s enterprises can prevent in advance, reduce 

their own losses, and the “non-commercial purpose” in the list should be deleted as appropriate. The 

problem with this clause is that it is so subjective that it cannot be predicted and avoided like other 

factors. The objective factors such as the degree of harm and damage to Chinese enterprises should be 

emphasized. On the other hand, we can learn from the successful experience of other countries. In this 

regard, the EU implements the scope of blocking in the form of annexes to regulations, which has the 

advantage of high transparency and strong predictability. In this way, the scope and specific targets of 

counter-sanctions can be defined in the form of annexes or memoranda. 

4.3 We Will Strengthen the Development of Legal Personnel Related to Foreign Affairs 

At the present stage, the number of foreign-related legal talents in China can no longer meet the market 

demand. In the process of enterprises responding to unreasonable unilateral sanctions of the United 

States, there are few talents who are familiar with extra-territorial laws and regulations and skilled in 

dealing with relevant legal relations, and there is a huge gap of legal talents in this aspect. Facing this 

situation, Chinese universities, government, foreign-related enterprises and law firms should cooperate 

and share information with each other: universities should reform the teaching content and strengthen 

the construction of international curriculum; Law firms, enterprises and judicial departments provide 

internship training for college students; The State should build an employment platform for 

foreign-related talents and complete the closed-loop training of foreign-related legal talents. 

 

5. Conclusion 

Unilateral sanctions are legal and logical. However, due to the lack of an international system that can 

effectively constrain unilateral sanctions and make them play their proper role, individual countries or 

economically integrated regions will abuse their own laws to impose unilateral sanctions and bully 

other countries to maintain their own or regional economic hegemony. What is more, the frequent use 

of this has become a common means to curb the normal functioning of other living areas of the country. 

Such unilateral sanctions as a means to curb the development of other countries violates the principles 

and rules of international law, and also undermines the international environment maintained by the 

whole world. In order to deal with this situation and reduce the damage caused to our entity enterprises, 

our country should speed up the construction of anti-sanctions legal system on the basis of what has 

been built, further clarify the scope of anti-sanctions, strengthen the construction of foreign-related rule 

of law talents, and build a complete all-round rule of law system, so as to safeguard national 

sovereignty and our interests. 

 

 

 

 



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References 

Bai, Y. (2018). From Analysis of the legality of international sanctions against Madagascar (Master’s 

thesis). Southwest University. 

Li, Q. (2022). From Research on the legal issues of our country’s anti-unilateral economic sanctions. 

East China University of Political Science and Law. 

Wang, D. D. (2022). From State responsibility under international law. China University of Political 

Science and Law. 

 

 

 

 

 

 


