Bush sides with Iran to block victims rights to sue tyrants for abuses

[bigtree]

BUSH OPPOSES SUIT AGAINST IRAN

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration has opposed an effort by the family of a slain opposition leader to sue the Iranian Defense Ministry.

The administration has supported Iran in rejecting a suit by the brother of a slain Iranian dissident who sought to collect a $2.8 million judgement from Cubic Defense Systems. Earlier, the Defense Ministry won a suit against Cubic for failing to honor a contract to the Iranian Air Force signed in 1977.

Officials said the administration was concerned that Elahi's victory could spark suits by terrorist victims against U.S. companies that owe money to Iran. The State Department has sought to use the billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets as a bargaining chip in future negotiations to restore relations with Teheran.

"This has nothing to do with the nature of the Iranian regime and its involvement in terrorism," an official said. "It has to do with setting a precedent that could boomerang against the the U.S. government and business."

http://www.menewsline.com/stories/2006/february/02_26_4.html


another reference: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/21/AR2006022100638_pf.html

[Dunvegan]

1. It's gonna look like the movie "Scanners" among the Neocon talking-heads.

[rodeodance]

2. 'business' trumps once again!

"This has nothing to do with the nature of the Iranian regime and its involvement in terrorism," an official said. "It has to do with setting a precedent that could boomerang against the the U.S. government and business."

[bigtree]

3. They'll always bend

for business

[thecrow]

4. suits by terrorist victims against U.S. companies that owe money to Iran.

"...suits by terrorist victims against U.S. companies that owe money to Iran...."

What? You mean they might sue Halliburton??? KBR???

[bigtree]

5. that's got to be it

also, Bush chose to use the assets of the Saddam regime, Iraq's money, to fuel the corporate takeover of Iraq's ecomony which was opened up by the US backed interim authority to unlimited foreign investment for the first time in its history. At the same time his administration has repeatedly blocked the victims and the family members of terrorist acts from suing for a share of assets already seized and held by the U.S government.

from an Insight article:

"We always knew the State Department was against these lawsuits and tried to scuttle them from day one," a representative of a group of victims' families tells Insight. "At every step of the way, they intervened - whether to block efforts to discover where frozen Iranian government assets were held, or how we could get them released once we found them on our own.

Lawyers from the State and Justice departments argued that the law crafted by Congress, and vetted by their own attorneys at the time, allowed victims of terrorism to sue in U.S. courts but not to seek damages because the language provided "no private cause of action against foreign governments." In response to questions from Insight, they insisted that the distinction was not just "splitting legal hairs." But attorneys who helped write the legislation contested that view and revealed that State Department attorneys made last-minute "technical changes" to the bill that required victims of terrorism to sue "officials, employees and agents" of a foreign state, rather than the government itself.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12060


that's the crux of the argument the Bush administration uses to subvert this Clinton law that held foreign governments accountable for terrorist acts they sponsored or encouraged. The argument is in this brief from the case cited in the op.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&navby=case&vol=000&invol=04-1095