The Iranian terrorist regime has reportedly sold five U.S. citizens back to America in exchange for some Iranian nationals who violated U.S. sanctions and $6 billion in cash.
The New York Times reports the deal was two years in the making. As with any deal made with Iran, we shouldn’t believe the agreement is a done deal until the Americans are back on U.S. soil.
“The move by Iran of the American hostages from Evin Prison to house arrest is an important development,” said Jared Genser, the lawyer for Siamak Namazi, one of the Americans released on Thursday.
Namazi will be taken to a Tehran hotel along with Emad Sharghi and Morad Tahbaz, who had all been imprisoned on unsubstantiated charges of spying. There are two other Americans whose families have requested their names not be released. One of the unnamed Americans is a scientist, and the other is a businessman.
The Americans will be held under guard for “several weeks” at the hotel while, if past experience holds true, the Iranians will try to extract additional concessions from Biden.
“While I hope this will be the first step to their ultimate release, this is at best the beginning of the end and nothing more,” Genser said in a statement. “But there are simply no guarantees about what happens from here.”
Maybe Joe will offer Hunter to the Iranians. He certainly has the international bribery connections.
The United States will also transfer nearly $6 billion of Iran’s assets in South Korea, putting the funds into an account in the central bank of Qatar, according to the people familiar with the deal. The account will be controlled by the government of Qatar and regulated so Iran can gain access to the money only to pay vendors for humanitarian purchases such as medicine and food, they said.
So Qatar, one of Iran’s only friends in the Middle East, is going to be in charge of making sure that Tehran only makes “humanitarian” purchases with the ransom money.
Why am I not comforted by that?
The movement of the Americans out of prison is only the first step in a protracted process that could last weeks. The funds to be unfrozen in South Korea will have to be converted into different currencies as requested by Iran, a lengthy process due to the provisions of U.S. sanctions.
As part of the swap, an unknown number of Iranians detained in the United States will be transferred from U.S. custody to Iran. The timing of that step remained unclear.
It should be noted that even if the money is used to only buy food and medicine, it frees up other Iranian funds that could be used to buy just about anything,
I’m glad the Americans are combining home. No one should be imprisoned in that hellhole Evin Prison. But why isn’t Biden bringing pressure to bear on the entire civilized world to force the barbarians in Tehran to stop taking hostages?
Thomas Jefferson had the right idea. Gunboat diplomacy.
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