The renewed refusal in January by the U.N. Security Council to ease economic sanctions on Iraq was based on that country's failure to comply with the Council's resolutions dealing with weapons of mass destruction. Iraq's human rights record was not directly at issue. Even so, the maintenance of sanctions raises troubling questions for those concerned about rights.

The sanctions, and the manner the government of Saddam Hussein has chosen to cope with them, have had devastating impact. In a once-prosperous country, some are at risk of starving to death and a great many more are undernourished. UNICEF reports that the shortages are damaging the health of pregnant women and nursing mothers; that the infant mortality rate is soaring; and that many children will be born mentally handicapped. Schools lack the most basic educational materials. Minor operations are performed without the benefit of anesthetics. So long as the sanctions are mainteined, the situation will continue to deteriorate.

Proponents of sanctions blame Saddam for Iraq's public health disaster, while insisting that such measures are needed to punish rogue governments and, thereby, to persuade them to change their ways. At times, sanctions have achieved such results. Notable examples are South Africa under apartheid and Poland under martial law. Even the thret of sanctions can have effect, as in China, where, so long as revocation of most-favored-nation status was a possibility, external pressure was effective in securing the freedom of a number of political prisoners.

Although not often articulated, one implicit goal of sanctions, in the view of some, is to cause such hardships that the populace will rise up and overthrow a regime whose policies are responsible. Many advocates of sanctions would disclaim such a purpose, of course, and they could point to "humanitarian" exceptions that allow food and medicine to be imported. Yet the effect of trade restrictions is to deny the export revenues needed to pay for such goods if they must be imported.

A strategy that aims to get rid of Saddam by spreading misery is, of itself, morally indefensible. Those pursuing such a course must be aware that the Iraqi government has compounded the effects of the sanctions by insuring that the Shites in the south, the Kurds in the north and the Marsh Arabs in the southeast suffer most. Against the danger of an uprising, Iraqi government has launched a new campaign of terror to demonstrate what lies in store for those who dare transgress Saddam's rules. Last June the official Iraqi newpaper,'Al-Jumhuriya', published a government decree that certain crimes against property - on the rise because of shortages - would be punished by amputation of the right hand at the wrist, and that a repeat offense would be punished by amputation of the left foot at the ankle. It also provides that a large "x" should be tattoed between the eyebrows of those punished by amputation. Other recent decrees impose harsh punishments on military deserters and evaders, including slicing off part o

f an ear for a first offense, cutting off the other ear for a second offense and death by firing squad for a third. As Patrick Cockburn recently reported in the British newspaper 'The Independent', the Iraqi government is making sure everyone is aware of the punishments by showing Tv footage of a prisoner lying in a hospital bed grimacing with pain as the camera pans to the bandaged arm, the severed hand the "x" on the victim's forehead. Apparently confident that it can suppress protests, the Iraqi government has refused to go along with Security Council resolutions that permit it to sell up to $1.6 billion worth oil under U.N. supervision, of which $900 million would go for medications and food and the remainder to pay reparations. Iraq says this infringes on its sovereignty. The effect is to deny most of its citizens urgently needed supplies. Yet favored classes - among them the residents of Tikrit (the hometown of Saddam and his extended family, who help him rule), the military and Baath party leaders - e

njoy privileges that protect them against hardship.

Russia and France have led a campaign to end the snctions, while the United States has been the leading advocate for their maintenance. Writing in the January/February issue of Foreign Affairs, the French diplomat Eric Rouleau has noted the level to which the debate has sunk:"A French minister suggested that the Clinton Administration's unremitting hostility to Iraq was due to electoral factors, while American official reported that France's advocacy of a progressive lifting of the oil embargo could be explained in 'mercantile' terms." In fact, each side may have a point. Yet the question that emerges is whether Saddam's boundless cruelty, which exacerbates the effects of the sanctions and makes his regime immune to one of the important weapons available to the international community to try to modify a government's behavior.

To lift the sanctions would signal to other ruthless dictators that they too can escape such measures by deliberately heightening their impact. To maintain the sanctions would do even more harm to Saddam's primary victims, the Iraqi people. Is there a way out of this dilemma? Although it would be expensive, and may not work because Saddam might obstruct the effort, a possible solution would be to couple the maintenance of sanctions with donations of food and medicine, preferably through international nongovernmental organizations that would distribute them in a nondiscriminatory fashion. It may seem contradictory to impose sanctions and simultaneously provide aid, but it would make clear that the legitimate purpose of sanctions is to punish a regime, not those who suffer under its rule.