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The Obama administration quietly shipped $400 million stacked on wooden pallets in an unmarked plane to Iran in January — just as Tehran was releasing four Americans who had been detained there, according to a report.
The huge cash load represented the first payment of a $1.7 billion debt that Iran, at an international tribunal in The Hague, claimed it was owed over a failed 1979 arms deal signed before the fall of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal Tuesday night.
The Obama administration was accused Tuesday night of making the cash-for-hostages deal by timing the payout to the release — but US officials said the money was simply part of settling the nearly 40-year-old debt under the terms of the historic nuclear agreement hammered out in 2015.
"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 told the Journal.
Source: New York Post
the Obama administration transferred the equivalent of $400 million to their central banks. It was then converted into other currencies, stacked onto the wooden pallets and sent to Iran on board a cargo plane.
Source: The Wall Street Journal
(Score: 2) by WillR on Thursday August 04 2016, @01:19PM
(Score: 4, Informative) by n1 on Thursday August 04 2016, @01:31PM
You must be new here... While this website has a tech focus, we are not editorially confining ourselves to technology.
We are volunteer powered with no commercial interests, it would be a shame to limit our scope to promoting other people's commercial interests -- which is what 80% of tech 'journalism/news' is, glorified press releases -- I think it's good we have the forum and the moderation system for a free and open discussion of global, social, political and economic issues and not just this weeks technology gimmick/phenomenon, changelogs for minor releases of linux distros, or a "production ready in 5-10 years..." type fluff.
Other opinions welcome...
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday August 04 2016, @05:34PM
Annnd! Loving it!
---Maxwell Smart
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Informative) by curunir_wolf on Thursday August 04 2016, @01:42PM
This isn't a "tech news" site, it's a Soylent News site. This item is certainly Soylent. Just check the "About" page:
I am a crackpot
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 04 2016, @08:52PM
General interest means /everyone/ is interested. At least one person isn't interested in this topic, so it doesn't belong here!! QED!!
(Score: 2) by gidds on Friday August 05 2016, @01:40PM
May I fix that for you?
I understand that, shocking as it may seem, there are a good few people here who aren't American, and while some internal US affairs are of interest to most people, many are less so.
I must admit to reading such things with same sort of fascination and horror with which one looks at a car accident across the road... but it does get wearing after a while.
Especially as the US bias is so strong. When was the last British news story covered, for example? (There are plenty of current stories that would seem to be of wider interest, such as today's Black Lives Matter demos, recent announcements of the ongoing impact of Brexit, the US woman stabbed in Russell Square, the ongoing honours scandal... — Yes, yes, I know you'll all tell me I should be submitting such stories myself. But I have barely have enough time to keep up with this site, and am usually a day or two behind.)
Let alone stories from other countries. There are something like 200-odd of them, after all!
So no. Please excuse me if I don't find this particular story of any 'general interest'.
[sig redacted]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 04 2016, @02:56PM
Maybe when you start your own site, you can limit it to all-tech, all the time.