That $400 million in cash was just good timing says White House of payment to Iran the same day prisoners were freed that Iranians called a 'ransom'

[superbeets]

[h=1]That $400 million in cash was just good timing says White House of payment to Iran the same day prisoners were freed that Iranians called a 'ransom'[/h]

• President Obama's administration paid $400m to Iran as part of a failed arms deal as they also lifted nuclear-related sanctions
• Four Americans were also released by Iran as part of a prisoner exchange
• Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian was among them; former U.S. Marine, a pastor and a fourth man were also set free
• Critics claim Obama gave cash as hostage payment for the four Americans - Iranian officials say it was 'ransom'
• But US officials insist the exchange came after ease of tensions between the two countries following the resolution
• Trump responded to the report, linking it to Hillary Clinton who was secretary of state between 2009 and 2013, before the cash payment

By FRANCESCA CHAMBERS, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT and HANNAH PARRY FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 20:05, 3 August 2016 | UPDATED: 20:12, 3 August 2016


The $400 million the United States stashed inside wooden pallets and secretly flew to Iran as four Americans were released from Tehran was not a 'ransom,' the White House said today.
'The United States under President Obama has not paid a ransom to secure the release of Americans unjustly detained in Iran and we're not going to pay a ransom,' White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest declared, rejecting Iranian officials' claims that the cash payment was just that.
The president's spokesman acknowledged that the timing of the transfer was not coincidental - but he backed up the administration's claim that the deal to give Iran the money it was owed fell into place as a result of positive momentum from the Iran deal.
'This all came to a head at the same time because we are addressing and resolving longstanding concerns with Iranian behavior and the benefits are almost too long to mention,' he told reporters today.

 

[superbeets]

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The $400 million the United States stashed inside wooden pallets and secretly flew to Iran as four Americans were released from Tehran was not a 'ransom,' the White House said today. The president and vice president are pictured above announcing the nuclear accord a year ago

The pallets, which were stuffed with euros, Swiss francs and other foreign currencies, arrived in Tehran on January 17. That same day, four US citizens were released in exchange for seven Iranians held in the United States.
Officials are denying any link between the payment and the prisoner exchange, saying the deal was part of a $1.7 billion settlement to resolve a failed 1979 arms deal, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Critics claim that the clandestine multi-million dollar payment was part of the hostage negotiations.
They also point to the fact that President Barack Obama failed to make any mention of the $400 million settlement that came about at an international tribunal in The Hague when he announced the prisoner release.
'With the nuclear deal done, prisoners released, the time was right to resolve this dispute as well,' was all Obama said on January 17.
Iranians had for decades demanded the return of the money that was paid to the Pentagon by Iran, shortly before the fall of Iran's last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to purchase US fighter jets.
They are owed an additional $1.3 billion on top of what they already received. The White House could not say today what the status of those negotiations were and directed inquiries to the Treasury Department.




Officials admit that Iranian negotiators had demanded cash over the exchange to show they had won something from the US in negotiations.
But they insist that negotiations on the prisoner exchange, and the failed arms deal settlement were completely separate.
'As we've made clear, the negotiations over the settlement of an outstanding claim…were completely separate from the discussions about returning our American citizens home,' State Department spokesman John Kirby said.
Obama's spokesman, Earnest, said, struck a similar note today as he insisted they were entirely separate negotiations that panned out at the same time.
'There was a conscious, strategic decision that was made on the part of the Obama administration, as we were implementing the deal to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, to resolve other longstanding concerns that we had with Iran,' he told a reporter who asked if the timing was a 'coincidence.'

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Trump responded to a report on the secret cash transfusion on Wednesday, blaming his rival Hillary Clinton for starting the the talks when she was secretary of state between 2009 and 2013. She left more than a year before the parties struck a deal

US officials say they realized the United States was going to lose its case over the arms deal in The Hague, where Iran was seeking more than $10 billion compensation with accrued interest and so they decided to settle the case.

Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, Arkansas, accused the Obama administration of paying a $1.7 billion 'ransom' for the hostages.
Senator Marco Rubio said Tuesday in a tweet, in response to the Wall Street Journal account, 'Obama administration sent plan load of cash to #Iran as ransom as part of deal on hostages. Just unreal. '
Since then, two more Americans have been taken hostage, the Florida Republican added.
Donald Trump tied the report his opponent in the race, saying on Twitter, 'Our incompetent Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was the one who started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran. Scandal!'
Clinton was secretary of state at the time the talks with Iran began, but she left more than a year before the nuclear accord came to fruition, and roughly two years before the US decided to pay back Iran for the military equipment it never received.
He also called it the 'Obama Administration's Terror Money Airlift' a research briefing outlining distributed to the press.
GOP lawmakers have also complained that the money could be used to fund terrorist groups such as Lebanese militia Hezbollah or it could be funding Assad's regime in Syria.
The White House said today that it too has 'concerns with some of Iran's nefarious activities.' The country has primarily used the money to 'prop up its currency,' though, Earnest said, and rebuild its infrastructure.
'We also know that they had significant debts that they were unable to pay and they were eager to repay those debts, and frankly, their creditors were eager to collect.'
But he also said, 'We know that Iran supports Hezbollah and the Assad regime, and it certainly is possible that some of the money that Iran has is being used for those purposes, too. '

 

[superbeets]

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President Obama sent $400 million to Iran last January as four American prisoners were released from Tehran, US officials have revealed (Pictured is Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian who had been held by Iran since July 2014)

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Former U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati (left) and pastor Saeed Abedini (right) were among the four men released in Janaury

The administration is aggressively pushing back on reports that the $400 million was in exchange for US hostages in spite of local reports that quoted Iranian defense officials describing the money as a ransom payment.
It is also refusing to say how the $1.7 billion was paid. Earnest said Wednesday that details like what was included in the Wall Street Journal report are make for 'colorful' reporting but do not change the baseline facts.
He contended that its irrelevant as to whether the money was wired or delivered as paper currency.
Officials say the $400 million was paid in foreign currency, because transactions with Iran in US dollars is illegal in the United States.
It was such a large amount of cash that the US was forced to transfer the money into the central banks of the Switzerland and the Netherlands.
Once the dollars were converted to foreign currency, it was stacked in the wooden pallets and sent off to Iran.
The cargo plane carrying the money arrived in Tehran’s Mehrabad airport on January 17 - the same day the American detainees were released.
Negotiations for their release began back in 2014 with Switzerland’s foreign minister hosting the discussions at the InterContinental Hotel, Geneva, on behalf of the US which has not had diplomatic interests in Iran since closing its Tehran embassy following the 1979 hostage crisis.

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Sanctions against Iran were lifted in January in a deal credited for bringing about the prisoner exchange (Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in January)

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US Secretary of State John Kerry, hailed the new deal with Iran which successfully resolved a decades-old failed arms deal, is pictured talking with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif

Talks began picking up pace in July 2015 when Iran agreed to restrain its nuclear program in exchange for the international sanctions against it being lifted.
US and European officials told the Wall Street Journal the negotiations began by focusing on a straight forward prisoner swap but grew to envelop compensation for the failed arms deal.
Eventually, Obama agreed to pay the $400 million and the four Americans were released from a Tehran prison last January.
Rezaian, a Washington Post reporter, had been held by Iran since July 2014, when he was arrested and convicted of supposed espionage offences.
U.S. officials confirmed that 39-year-old Rezaian, former U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati, pastor Saeed Abedini and a fourth man, all of whom have U.S.-Iranian dual nationality, had been freed.
Pastor Saeed Abedni, was jailed for three years on charges of undermining national security, and former US Marine Amir Hekmati, who is serving 10 years for supposedly cooperating with hostile governments, were also released. A fourth man, Nosratollah Khosavi-Roodsari, was released but chose to stay in Iran. Little is known about his background or his arrest.
The three Americans returning home flew via Switzerland before being taken to a base in Germany for medical treatment.
Meanwhile a fifth American - student Matthew Trevithick - was also freed, but this was unrelated to the prisoner swap, which saw seven Iranian prisoners released or pardoned by the United States.

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A fifth American, student Matthew Trevithick (right), was also freed in January but this was unrelated to the prisoner swap

A US official told the Washington Post at the time that 'Iranians wanted a goodwill gesture' in return, leading to the release of seven Iranian prisoners.
Iranian state media named the men as Nader Modanlo, Bahram Mechanic, Khosrow Afghahi, Arash Ghahraman, Tooraj Faridi, Nima Golestaneh and Ali Saboonchi.
All of the men were joint U.S.-Iranian citizens with the exception of Golestaneh who studied in Vermont but never gained citizenship.
Golestaneh was serving a jail sentence after admitting trying to steal millions of dollars of U.S. company software for the Iranian government.
Modanlo, Ghahreman and Saboonchi were all serving sentences for illegally supplying Iran with technology in violation of the U.S. trade bans.
Mechanic, Faridi and Afghahi, all of whom were arrested as part of the same alleged conspiracy, were also accused of violating the trade bans but were awaiting trial before being released.
Rezaian, who was born in California, was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage. The Post and the U.S. government denied the accusations, as did Rezaian.
He was sentenced to an undisclosed amount of time in jail.
The reporter, who was the Post's Tehran correspondent was originally detained with his wife in July 2014, but she was released on bail in October that year.
Former Marine Amir Hekmati, originally from Flint, Michigan, was arrested in Iran on espionage charges in 2011.

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In January, US officials announced they were lifting 30 years of sanctions against Iran

His family said he has lost significant weight in jail and has trouble breathing, raising fears he could have contracted tuberculosis.
Mr Hekmati went to Iran to visit family and spend time with his ailing grandmother.
After his arrest, his family says they were told to keep the matter quiet. He was sentenced to death in 2012. After a higher court ordered a retrial, he was sentenced in 2014 to 10 years in prison.
Pastor Saeed Abedini, from Boise, Idaho, was detained in 2012 for compromising national security after he was found to be preaching Christianity.
He was sentenced in 2013 to eight years in prison. President Barack Obama met his wife and children in 2015.
There are claims he was beaten in Iranian prison.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump criticized the deal at the time as not being fair to America.
According to The Guardian , Trump told a rally in New Hampshire: 'They're getting seven people, so essentially they get $150 billion plus seven, and we get four.'
The announcement of the prisoners' release came - and was likely directly linked to - the imminent lifting of sanctions imposed on the Islamic republic.
'Implementation day' of the nuclear deal agreed last year marks the biggest re-entry of a former pariah state onto the global economic stage since the end of the Cold War.
It also marks a turning point in the hostility between Iran and the United States that has shaped the Middle East since 1979.
Under the deal, Iran has agreed to stop enriching uranium, which world powers feared could be used to make a nuclear weapon.
Once sanctions are lifted, Iran plans to swiftly ramp up its exports of oil. Global companies that have been barred from doing business there are likely to set up shop almost immediately.

• SHARE PICTURE

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John Kerry hailed the lifting of sanctions following a nuclear deal, saying: 'The entire world is safer because the threat of the nuclear weapon has been reduced'

 

[superbeets]

Iran's transport minister said the country had already agreed a deal with Airbus to buy 114 planes after the sanctions are removed.
Secretary of State John Kerry had praised the prisoner release as an improvement in relations between the two countries.
Kerry said Iran had met its obligations to the U.N. atomic watchdog and that the sanctions have now been lifted as per promises made in the landmark nuclear agreement.
In a statement, Kerry said: 'Iran has undertaken significant steps that many, and I do mean many, people doubted would ever come to pass.
'And that should be recognized, even though the full measure of this achievement can only be realized by assuring continued full compliance in the coming years.
'Today marks the moment that the Iran nuclear agreement transitions from an ambitious set of promises on paper to measurable action in progress.
'Today, as a result of the actions taken since last July, the United States, our friends and allies in the Middle East, and the entire world are safer because the threat of the nuclear weapon has been reduced.'
Since the prisoner exchange, Iran's Revolutionary Guard has arrested three more Iranian-Americans.
[h=3]PRISONER SWAP: THE MEN RELEASED AND THEIR ALLEGED CRIMES[/h]American prisoners released by Iran

• Jason Rezaian

Born in Marin, California,, Rezanian's father was an Iranian immigrant, which led to his own lifelong fascination with the Middle East and his ancestral home.
Rezanian moved to Tehran to work as a foreign correspondent after college, before being appointed bureau chief for the Washington Post in 2012, according to the BBC.
Arrested by Iranian authorities in July 2014, Rezanian spent nine months in solitary confinement, reportedly suffering both physical and mental health problems.
Tried in secret for espionage he was convicted on October 2015, though no details of his sentence or the evidence against him were ever released.

• Amir Hekmati

An American of Iranian descent, Hekmati grew up in Flint, Michigan, and served as a U.S. Marine fighting in Iraq during the second Gulf war.
Imprisoned for espionage while visiting his family in Tehran in 2011, Hekmati was subsequently sentenced to death, though this was later overturned, the New York Times reports.
He was then convicted of serving a hostile country and handed a 10-year prison sentence in 2012, which he was appealing before being released.

• Saeed Abedini

Raised in Boise, Idaho, Abedini was a convert to Christianity who later began working for the church, eventually becoming a pastor.
In 2012 Abedini was visiting his family in Tehran while also finalizing arrangements for a Christian orphanage he was due to build in Iran, according to the Be Heard Project.
While there, he was detained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and spent time in solitary confinement, during which he claimed he was beaten and denied medical treatment.
In 2013 he was sentenced to eight years in prison for subverting Iranian security by creating an international network of churches.

• Nosratollah Khosavi-Roodsari

Nosratollah Khosavi-Roodsari was released alongside the other three Americans but chose to stay in Iran.
Little is known about his background or his arrest.
Iranian prisoners released by America

• Nader Modanlo

Born in Iran, Modanlo is believed to have moved to the U.S. in 1979 before studying at George Washington University and going on to become a mechanical engineer.
His career included jobs at NASA and the Department of Defense before he was arrested in 2010 and accused of illegally providing satellite services to Iran.
Prosecutors said Mondanlo illegally brokered a deal between Iran and a Russian state-backed company to help his home country launch its first satellite.
He was convicted in 2013 and sentenced to eight years in jail, the Huffington Post reports.

• Bahram Mechanic, Tooraj Faridi and Khosrow Afghahi

Iranian-born Mechanic moved to America before making himself a billionaire through his Houston-based electronics company Smart Power Systems.
In April last year Mechanic was arrested after the FBI accused him of being part of a procurement network shipping parts to an Iranian company he also owned to be used in their nuclear program.
Also arrested was Mechanic's nephew, Tooraj Faridi, who was serving as the vice president of Smart Power Systems at the time, along with business partner Khosrow Afghahi, the Houston Chronicle reported.
All three men were awaiting trial before they were released from custody earlier today.

• Nima Golestaneh

An Iranian student studying in Vermont, Golestaneh was accused in 2013 of hacking into the computers of an aerodynamics company to steal millions of dollars worth of computer software.
Detained in Turkey, Golestaneh was deported to the U.S. in February last year in order to face trial, pleading guilty in December. He was awaiting sentencing.

• Arash Ghahreman

Ghahreman was born in Iran but came to the U.S. in 2006 after winning a visa lottery before settling in Staten Island, New York.
Between 2012 and 2013, Ghahreman shipped military-grade navigation equipment overseas to Dubai, where it was collected by a front-company for the Iranian state.
Ghahreman was arrested after a sting by Homeland Security agents, and accused of selling the devices, despite knowing their ultimate location.
In April last year he was sentenced to six and a half years in jail after being found guilty at trial, SI Live reports.

• Ali Saboonchi

A U.S. citizen from Maryland, Saboonchi operated Ace Electric Company from his hometown of Parkville, north of Kansas City.
Starting in November 2009, the FBI claims Saboonchi used his company to export industrial components to Dubai and China, where co-conspirators passed them on to Iran.
In 2014 he was convicted and sentenced to two years in jail, a stretch he was coming to the end of before being released.
Also released...

• Matthew Trevithick

An American student who also worked as a journalist in war-torn nations such as Syria, Mali and Afghanistan was also released by Iran today, though not as part of the prisoner swap.
Trevithick, whose detention was not widely known about until today, had been detained in Tehran in December last year while he was there studying languages.



Read more:

• U.S. Sent Cash to Iran as Americans Were Freed - WSJ

 

[superbeets]

[h=6]- AUGUST 03, 2016 -[/h][h=1]THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION’S TERROR MONEY AIRLIFT[/h]

Reports Published Today Show The Obama Administration Gave Iran, The World’s Foremost State Sponsor Of Terrorism, $400 Million In Hard Currency – Money That Will Undoubtedly Find Its Way Into The Hands Of Terrorists ​

This Year The Obama Administration “Secretly Organized An Airlift Of $400 Million Worth Of Cash To Iran” Via “Wooden Pallets Stacked With Euros, Swiss Francs And Other Currencies” On “An Unmarked Cargo Plane.”“The Obama administration secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran, according to U.S. and European officials and congressional staff briefed on the operation afterward. Wooden pallets stacked with Euros, Swiss francs and other currencies were flown into Iran on an unmarked cargo plane, according to these officials.”(Jay Solomon And Carol E. Lee, “U.S. Sent Cash To Iran As Americans Were Freed,”The Wall Street Journal, 8/2/16)

The $400 Million In Hard Currency Was The “First Installment Of A $1.7 Billion Settlement The Obama Administration Reached With Iran.”“The Obama administration secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran, according to U.S. and European officials and congressional staff briefed on the operation afterward. … The money represented the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a decades-old dispute over a failed arms deal signed just before the 1979 fall of Iran’s last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.”(Jay Solomon And Carol E. Lee, “U.S. Sent Cash To Iran As Americans Were Freed,”The Wall Street Journal, 8/2/16)

“The $400 Million Was Paid In Foreign Currency Because Any Transaction With Iran In U.S. Dollars Is Illegal Under U.S. Law.”(Jay Solomon And Carol E. Lee, “U.S. Sent Cash To Iran As Americans Were Freed,”The Wall Street Journal, 8/2/16)

Iran Is Recognized As “The Foremost State Sponsor Of Terrorism”:

National Director Of Intelligence James Clapper: “Iran—The Foremost State Sponsor Of Terrorism—Continues To Exert Its Influence In Regional Crises In The Middle East.”“Iran—the foremost state sponsor of terrorism—continues to exert its influence in regional crises in the Middle East through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—Qods Force (IRGC-QF), its terrorist partner Lebanese Hizballah, and proxy groups. It also provides military and economic aid to its allies in the region. Iran and Hizballah remain a continuing terrorist threat to US interests and partners worldwide. (James R. Clapper, Statement For The Record,U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, PP. 10, 2/9/16)

The State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism Listed Iran As A State Sponsor Of Terrorism And Said That They Had Increased Their Activity In 2015.“Designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism in 1984, Iran continued its terrorist-related activity in 2015, including support for Hizballah, Palestinian terrorist groups in Gaza, and various groups in Iraq and throughout the Middle East. In 2015, Iran increased its assistance to Iraqi Shia terrorist groups, including Kata’ib Hizballah (KH), which is a U.S. designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, as part of an effort to fight the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Iraq and bolster the Asad regime in Syria. Iran used the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) to implement foreign policy goals, provide cover for intelligence operations, and create instability in the Middle East. The IRGC-QF is Iran’s primary mechanism for cultivating and supporting terrorists abroad.”(State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism, U.S. State Department, Chapter 3-State Sponsored Terrorism, 6/2/16)

Iran Has Been Funding Terrorist Groups Working Against U.S Interests In Their Region:

Iran Has Been Assisting Hizballah Rearm Since 2006 And Has Given Their Organization In Lebanon “Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars.”“Since the end of the 2006 Israeli-Hizballah conflict in 2006, Iran has also assisted in rearming Hizballah, in direct violation of UNSCR 1701. Iran has provided hundreds of millions of dollars in support of Hizballah in Lebanon and has trained thousands of its fighters at camps in Iran. These trained fighters have used these skills in direct support of the Asad regime in Syria and, to a lesser extent, in support of operations against ISIL in Iraq. They have also carried out isolated attacks along the Lebanese border with Israel.”(State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism, U.S. State Department, Chapter 3-State Sponsored Terrorism, 6/2/16)

Iran Has Funded And Armed Shia Terrorist Groups In Iraq That Have “Exacerbated Sectarian Tensions In Iraq And Have Committed Serious Human Rights Abuses Against Primarily Sunni Civilians.”“In Iraq, Iranian combat forces employed rockets, artillery, and drones against ISIL. Iran also increased its arming and funding of Iraqi Shia terrorist groups in an effort to reverse ISIL gains in Iraq. Many of these groups, such as KH, have exacerbated sectarian tensions in Iraq and have committed serious human rights abuses against primarily Sunni civilians. The IRGC-QF, in concert with Hizballah, provided training outside of Iraq, as well as advisors inside Iraq for Shia militants in the construction and use of advanced weaponry. Similar to Hizballah fighters, many of these trained Shia militants have used these skills to fight for the Asad regime in Syria or against ISIL in Iraq.”(State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism, U.S. State Department, Chapter 3-State Sponsored Terrorism, 6/2/16)

Iran Has Been Funding Hamas And Other Terrorist Groups Carrying Out Attacks Against Israel.“Iran has historically provided weapons, training, and funding to Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups, including Palestine Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command. These Palestinian terrorist groups have been behind a number of deaths from attacks originating in Gaza and the West Bank. Although Hamas’s ties to Tehran have been strained due to the Syrian civil war, both sides took steps in 2015 to repair relations. Iran continued to declare its vocal support for Palestinian terrorist groups and its hostility to Israel in 2015. Supreme National Security Council Secretary Admiral Ali Shamkhani sought to frame a series of individual Palestinian attacks on Israeli security forces in the West Bank as a new “Intifada” in a speech on November 25.”(State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism, U.S. State Department, Chapter 3-State Sponsored Terrorism, 6/2/16)

Iran Has Remained Unwilling To Bring Justice To Senior al-Qa’ida (AQ) Members.“Iran remained unwilling to bring to justice senior al-Qa’ida (AQ) members it continued to detain and refused to publicly identify the members in its custody. Iran previously allowed AQ facilitators to operate a core facilitation pipeline through Iran since at least 2009, enabling AQ to move funds and fighters to South Asia and Syria.”(State Department’s Annual Country Report On Terrorism, U.S. State Department, Chapter 3-State Sponsored Terrorism, 6/2/16)

 

[ScottL]

Reagan and Bush did far less and the press dogged them for years.

This 400 Million dollar Obama scam would get any R impeached.

 

[superbeets]

[h=6]- AUGUST 03, 2016 -[/h][h=1]BREAKING: WSJ: JUSTICE DEPARTMENT OFFICIALS RAISED OBJECTIONS ON U.S. CASH PAYMENT TO IRAN[/h]"This administration has embarassed our country as no administration has before, going so far as to fund Islamic terror through cash payments to Iran. Nothing less than a full investigation is required, and if email-destroying Hillary Clinton can't break from Obama on this then she is even more corrupt than anyone imagined." - Stephen Miller, Senior Policy Advisor

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Please read the following excerpts from "Justice Department Officials Raised Objections On U.S. Cash Payment To Iran" by Devlin Barrett, The Wall Street Journal,8/3/16
"Senior Justice Department officials objected to sending a plane loaded with cash to Tehran at the same time that Iran released four imprisoned Americans, but their objections were overruled by the State Department, according to people familiar with the discussions.
What wasn’t disclosed at the time was that the first payment would be $400 million in cash, flown in as the prisoners were released, as The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
The timing and manner of the payment raised alarms at the Justice Department, according to those familiar with the discussions.
“People knew what it was going to look like, and there was concern the Iranians probably did consider it a ransom payment,’’ said one of the people.
...
But the concerns in the department show that even within the Obama administration there were worries that the pallets of cash could send the wrong signal to Iran—and potentially to others—about U.S. policy when it came to hostages.
...
The Justice Department raised other objections to the Iran deals.
Prosecutors were concerned that the U.S. would release too many Iranian convicts and drop too many pending criminal cases against people suspected of violating sanctions laws.
...
The cash transfer and prisoner exchange coincided with the formal implementation that same weekend of the landmark nuclear agreement reached between Tehran, the U.S. and other global powers the summer before."

 

[busterhyman]

wish i had that kind of timing

 

[russ1945]

The White House
Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release

June 24, 2015​

[h=1]Statement by the President on the U.S. Government's Hostage Policy Review[/h]











Obama quote from the above:

First, I’m updating our hostage policy. I’m making it clear that our top priority is the safe and rapid recovery of American hostages. And to do so, we will use all elements of our national power. I am reaffirming that the United States government will not make concessions, such as paying ransom, to terrorist groups holding American hostages.

 

[Coldweather]

hno:

 

[Dave007inVegas]

The White House
Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release

June 24, 2015​

Statement by the President on the U.S. Government's Hostage Policy Review













Obama quote from the above:

First, I’m updating our hostage policy. I’m making it clear that our top priority is the safe and rapid recovery of American hostages. And to do so, we will use all elements of our national power. I am reaffirming that the United States government will not make concessions, such as paying ransom, to terrorist groups holding American hostages.

What? Obliviously you do. And that folks is how dummed down the American people have become. 50% swallow this shit and do it without reflux.

 

[russ1945]

[h=1]Clinton Calls Delivery of $400 Million to Iran ‘Old News’[/h]SHARE
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BY: Jack Heretik
August 4, 2016 12:15 pm
Hillary Clinton referred to the new report this week that the Obama administration airlifted $400 million to the Iranian government in Swiss francs and euros as “old news,” saying the White House has addressed the matter.
Clinton’s comments stand in contrast to what many in Congress are saying, that the administration left them completely in the dark on the money transfer, as reported by the Washington Free Beaconon Thursday.
When asked by a reporter for her view of the Iranian money shipment, Clinton skipped over many of the recent revelations about the transfer.
“Well, the White House has addressed this, and I think actually, this is kind of old news,” Clinton said. “It was first reported about seven or eight months ago as I recall.”

ADVERTISING​

Reports from January, when the money transfer was made, mainly focused on the ruling by the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal at the Hague and the U.S. government’s intention to pay a large sum to settle a decades-old claim dating back before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
New details revealed this week have raised questions about whether the $400 million was a ransom payment for Americans being held captive by Iran. The payment was made at the same time that Americans detained in Iran were released. The United States is set to pay a total of $1.7 billion to the Iranian regime.
The Free Beacon’sreport from Thursday shows that many congressional inquiries sent by lawmakers for information on the $1.7 billion were stonewalled by the State Department and other administration officials, which could undercut Clinton’s claim that this story was already discussed in full seven months ago.

 

[GasMan]

Has there ever been a weaker bunch of losers in charge of our country? Unfortunately I think we get 8 more years and its bye bye USA. Secession will immediately follow the abolishment of the second ammendment once the SC appointee is made by Hildabitch.

 

[GasMan]

And for the record, the liberals can take all the illegals and welfare losers.

 

[Dave007inVegas]

The only thing I have to say about the $400 million ransom payment is, So What?


Is someone going to do something about it other than bitch?


No.


So shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down and vote early and often for Hillary to ensure more of the same.

 

[GasMan]

Sadly Dave you are right. Guesser must be pissed at the Dems for this...giving nukes and $400M to Israels mortal enemy.
Why is he not speaking out about this lunacy?
Does he secretly pray for the destruction of Israel?

 

[ScottL]

"Clinton Calls Delivery of $400 Million to Iran ‘Old News’"

Ever been stiffed by a guy? Some time passes you find out a few years later someone you know is betting with the guy. So you caution the person. The next day the person gets back to you and he says the guy said, "Oh, that was 10 years ago!" Like it isn't a stiff now because years have passed SMH

 

[Dave007inVegas]

Sadly Dave you are right. Guesser must be pissed at the Dems for this...giving nukes and $400M to Israels mortal enemy.
Why is he not speaking out about this lunacy?
Does he secretly pray for the destruction of Israel?

He’s busy masturbating.

 

[ScottL]

So much hot air coming out of his mouth hole as I type I'm afraid he's going to turn global warming into an actual thing.

 

[vitterd]

I think Obama just closed this thread......but I'm sure it will somehow continue.