Re growing calls for sanctions on Myanmar this morning, worth remembering that prior to 2016 the country faced pretty hefty US/EU sanctions. Brief thoughts on past sanctions and their results ... 1/

Some say sanctions helped bring about free elections (both the US and the EU linked the gradual easing of sanctions to parliamentary by-elections of 2012, with remaining US sanctions lifted in 2016 at the end of Obama's presidency). 2/

Others also point out that Myanmar reacted like most other sanctioned countries do, by diversifying its products and its trading partners, with ASEAN countries + China, Japan, South Korea absorbing the sanctions shock. 3/ https://thediplomat.com/2018/01/how-did-sanctions-impact-myanmar/

This trade diversification has likely expanded since 2016, after the lifting of sanctions. New US/EU/UK (the UK now acting outside the EU's sanctions framework) sanctions would surely send a signal, but have limited effect. 4/

Sanctions are becoming increasingly polarising and unpopular, and Western-led calls for sanctions might find little sympathy among the countries that actually have economic links to Myanmar (+ ASEAN unlikely to sanction a fellow member). 5/

This is not to say that sanctions should or should not be pursued, but that we need to rethink when and how we do sanctions, and let unilateral sanctions be the last resort. Could Japan and South Korea be part of a sanctions strategy? Can this be pursued at the UN-level? etc etc.