White House: $400M Iran payment wasn’t ransom

He said Sunday he would hold a hearing on whether the payment was a “quid pro quo for the release of American hostages”, and whether the money was used to finance terrorism by groups aligned with Iran.

The top GOP leadership and the Trump Campaign was busy in making quick political capital by claiming it was nothing but ransom amount, which has finally been recognized by the Obama Administration.

“We’ve gone from not negotiating with terrorists to paying a ransom to the leading state sponsor of terrorism”, Congressman Palmer tweeted, linking to an Associated Press report that the administration had conceded that the payment “was contingent on American prisoners’ release”. Officially, this is money that the USA government had to return to Iran.

Trump said, Obama has lied about money, we never give ransom money.

Republican presidential nominee Donald J. Trump joined the chorus of critics, saying President Obama “lied” about the nature of the payment and subsequently “put every American traveling overseas, including our military personnel, at greater risk of being kidnapped”.

“One of the Iranian-Americans in a USA prison then refused his pardon initially”, said the official, “and the Iranians in Geneva said that, unless he accepted his pardon, they would not release our people”. As mean as it may seem, if you do it once, they will keep taking prisoners. Iran asked the U.S.to pressure them into leaving, but the American negotiators refused, he said.

In early August, the State Department had said the prisoner release and delivery of money were completely separate, although Kirby acknowledged Thursday that the two were in fact related.

“The president owes the American people a full accounting of his actions and the unsafe precedent he has set”, Ryan added. “Americans around the world are at increased risk because of this risky decision by the Obama administration”, ays Fischer.

The amount Dollars 400 million will be paid only after the prisoners were released. As a result, the US opted to settle with Iran. Had the money been returned to Iran before the release of the Americans and had Iran then reneged on releasing them, the Obama administration would have been pilloried, rightfully, for not holding back Iran’s money as insurance for the Americans’ return. USA officials had pinned the delays on difficulties finding Rezaian’s wife and mother, and ensuring they could depart Iran with him. Hours earlier, Iran had released the prisoners, who included Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian and scholar Matthew Trevithick. Iran also became miffed when it learned that the prisoners being released in the United States didn’t want to travel to Iran, the official said.

“What works is that Iran released four American citizens who were being unjustly detained in exchanged for seven individuals being released in the United States”.