US prisoners freed by Iran arrive in Germany to get medical care

“The US sanctions against Iran’s ballistic missile programme… have no legal or moral legitimacy”, he said.

According to a statement issued by the U.S. Treasury Department, six Iranian nationals and 11 companies were blacklisted by the U.S. authority for their involvement in the missile program.

Iran conducted a ballistic missile test in October, which the United Nations called a breach of a resolution prohibiting the Islamic Republic from developing missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads.

The lifting of sanctions allows Iran to rejoin the global economy and begin selling its massive oil reserves in worldwide markets, which could drive the price to as low as US$10 a barrel within months.

About resolving the three-decade old financial dispute with Iran, Obama said Tehran would be “returned its own funds, including appropriate interest, but much less than the amount Iran sought”. An American official said on Saturday that there is no link between the nuclear deal and the release of the Americans.

“It reflects a pattern we’ve seen in the Obama administration over and over again of negotiating with terrorists and making deals and trades that endanger U.S. safety and security”, Texas senator Ted Cruz, a leading Republican presidential contender, said on Fox News on Sunday.

“We have deals that are being worked out with Airbus – all sorts of companies from nuclear technology companies, to irrigation, green energy… a whole range of them”, he said.

This is a clean bill of health certifying that all nuclear activities in Iran are being used for peaceful purposes, and Amano said last year that this could take “years and years”. Also released were Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian, former U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati, Christian pastor Saeed Abedini and Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari – all four of whom have American-Iranian citizenship. Several Iranian-Americans held in US prisons after being charged or convicted for sanctions violations have also been released, their lawyers told Reuters on Sunday. A U.S. official said the programme would “continue to be subject to worldwide sanctions”.