The president completely avoided the mention of the $400m cash payment during his address on 17 January in the White House that followed the release of the four Americans.
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The U.S. has a long held policy of never paying ransom to countries who take Americans hostage.
The Obama administration airlifted $400 million in cash to Iran just as the Islamic republic was freeing four American hostages, a report said.
In addition to the $400 million, there is an additional $1.3 billion in accumulated interest owed to Iran.
The money was paid in Euros and other currency acquired from the central banks of the Netherlands and Switzerland, since making a transaction with Iran in American dollars remains illegal under USA law.
Prior to the Wall Street Journal report, ransom claims were tossed around, but White House officials responded by saying the timing was purely coincidental. Music provided courtesy of APM Music. “By continuing to kowtow to the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism, all while trying to hide their actions from Congress and the American people, the Obama Administration will only put more lives at risk along the way”.
The State Department defended the payment.
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 US and other global powers the summer before.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest heatedly beat back suggestions the money transfer to Iran was ransom, or a secret.
The cash load was allegedly the first payment of a $1.7 billion deal that Obama and Iran crafted over a failed arms deal signed in 1979. Mark Kirk, R-Illinois, again highlighted those concerns. “It’s an indication of just how badly opponents of the Iran deal are struggling to justify their opposition to a successful deal that has prevented, and continues to prevent Iran, from developing a nuclear weapon”.
Since the cash shipment, the intelligence arm of the Revolutionary Guard has arrested two more Iranian-Americans.
The Iranians reportedly insisted on cash because they said they had trouble making wire transfers.
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“Our incompetent Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was the one who started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran”.
