Simultaneously, the government was preparing for the safe return of Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, former U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati, Christian Pastor Saeed Abedini and the relatively unknown Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, who elected to stay in Iran. He added that the two negotiations were entirely separate and “conducted by different teams on each side”.
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The charge comes on the heels of a Wall Street Journal report saying the USA sent the money just as Tehran released four American detainees in January.
The settlement, which resolved claims before an worldwide tribunal in The Hague, also coincided with the formal implementation that same weekend of the landmark nuclear agreement reached between Tehran, the USA and other global powers the summer before.
However, critics not that President Barack Obama never disclosed the $400 million cash payment when he announced the Iran nuclear deal on January 17 or how the $1.7 billion was paid.
“I am reaffirming that the United States government will not make concessions, such as paying ransom, to terrorist groups holding American hostages”, President Obama said in a statement in June 2015.
The White House said the payment was not a “ransom” for the release of the prisoner and that the timing was a coincidence.
According to the paper, the Obama administration wired $400 million to central banks in Switzerland and then had the dollars converted to foreign currencies such as euros, and Swiss francs. In its response, the administration confirmed that taxpayers would be on the hook for the $1.7 billion payment, but denied any connection between the settlement and the prisoners’ release.
However, U.S. officials admitted that Iranian negotiators wanted the cash in exchange of the prisoners, to feel they had gained “something tangible”. “Scandal!” tweeted Trump on Wednesday.
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that the transfer was not a ransom payment because the USA has a policy of not paying ransom for hostages.
“We don’t know the details of the deal that is bringing them home, and it may well be there are some very problematic aspects to this deal”, then-candidate Sen.
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“We have not, we will not, pay ransom to secure the release of USA citizens”, Earnest said.
