State Dept: U.S. Paid $400M For Iran Prisoner Release

After reports revealed that the U.S. sent $400 million in cash to Iran around the same time that four U.S. prisoners walked free in January, the Obama administration said that the two events had no connection. Now, the State Department has said that the payment was used as “leverage” to ensure that Iran freed the prisoners.

On August 18, White House spokesman John Kirby said that, while the money did not exactly amount to ransom, the $400 million payment was contingent on Iran releasing the prisoners, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“With concerns Iran may renege on the prisoner release given unnecessary delays regarding persons in Iran who could not be located, as well as mutual mistrust between Iran and the United States, we of course sought to retain maximum leverage until after American citizens were released — our top priority,” Kirby said.

President Obama said at the time that the U.S. has a “policy that we don’t pay ransom,” saying that it “defies logic” to think that they would “somehow start now, in this high profile way.”

“We announced these payments in January,” Obama told Pentagon reporters. “Many months ago. “They were not a secret.”

And officials have maintained that the negotiations did not overlap.

“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,” said Kirby. “Not only were the two negotiations separate, they were conducted by different teams on each side, including, in the case of The Hague claims, by technical experts involved in these negotiations for many years.”

Many people questioned the nature of the transactions after reports showed that Iran released U.S. Pastor Saeed Abedini, Washington Post Tehran Bureau Chief Jason Rezaian, former U.S. Marine Amir Hekmati and businessman Nosratollah Khosrawi-Roodsari the day after the two countries reached a deal to remove some of Iran’s sanctions, while the shipment of Euros, Swiss francs and other currency was delayed until the Swiss Air Force craft carrying the Americans departed from Tehran, reports USA Today.

Now, U.S. officials acknowledge that Iranian negotiators for the prisoner release asked for the cash as a sign that they had made tangible progress.

It is illegal under U.S. law to send any transactions to Iran in U.S. dollars, and Tehran has limited access to global banks due to the sanctions imposed upon them.

Sources: Wall Street Journal, CNN, USA Today / Photo Credit: White House/Flickr