Kaveh Afrasiabi: US must compensate 1988 Iranian passenger plane victims

Press TV has conducted an interview with Kaveh Afrasiabi, author and political scientist from Boston, about Iran’s response to the US Supreme Court’s ruling for confiscating Iranian assets under the guise of law.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: How do you feel about this entire case?

Afrasiabi: I think that Foreign Minister Zarif is absolutely correct on calling this ruling as contrary to international law and his views are in fact shared by a number of American international law experts. Case in point, just a couple of days ago there was an opinion article in the New York Times by two prominent American law professors categorically stating that the Supreme Court ruling is against international law, specifically one of the basic tenets of international law, which is the doctrine of sovereign immunity, and the US Congress has trashed that concept. And now the US Supreme Court has put a seal of legitimacy on it allowing the basic plunder of Iranian asset under the guise of law.

And this, in turn, raises the question of what about justice for the victims of the Iranian passenger airplane that was shot in cold blood by the US or the thousands of Iranian victims of chemical attack by the Iraqis with the complicity of the US and other Western governments, because we know for a fact that the US provided coordinates for the Iraqi chemical attacks on the Iranians.

And there are some upwards of 20,000 victims of chemical attacks living in Iran today, who have a legitimate case to bring multi-multi-billion- dollar lawsuits against the US.

So this ruling really opens a Pandora’s box; is likely to backfire on the US itself, which privileges itself with absolute sovereign immunity in other countries’ courts, and yet allows itself the green light to go after other nations’ assets with impunity.

Press TV: What is the goal then with the US government supporting the Supreme Court ruling, because at this time when the JCPOA is meant to be implemented by the other side, now we’re seeing such cases coming up?

Afrasiabi: Unfortunately it’s out of the hands of the executive branch. There is collusion between the legislative branch, the US Congress and the Supreme Court. And in fact, there is a minority opinion in that case that questions the seizing of the authority of the court by the Congress and that is shared by many international law experts as well, as I said. But the train has left the station and right now these hungry hyenas, the plaintiffs and their attorneys, are just waiting for time before a judge decides on how to share the pie and disperse these billions of dollars of the Iranian asset.

And as Justice Ginsburg herself who wrote the opinion for this infamous ruling said, this involves multiple cases not just one case, which means that other rulings with respect to 9/11 and so forth adversely affecting Iran are in the wings. And very soon they will be eyeing Iran’s asset not just in the US but also in Europe and elsewhere, and it’s a really bad omen and Iran needs to go beyond rhetorical condemnation and take effective countermeasures.

Press TV: How much worse are things about to get? You’ve said that already they may be eyeing other assets as well. Do you think that this is not the last of this sort of things?

Afrasiabi: No unfortunately I think that this is only the beginning of a very bad and ominous chapter that will rub off on the nuclear deal as well, partly because of the sea of anger that it has generated in Iran, rightly so, over this open heist of the Iranian asset under the guise of law. And the US government has now backed this ruling, which means that there is no political opposition whatsoever to it and to what is going to come as the next waves of this kind of heist in the future.

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