Iran Makes Contradictory Remarks About Frozen Funds Abroad

Iranian officials continue to issue conflicting statements regarding the status of Iran's frozen assets abroad, with no clarity as to which funds have been released.

At times, they assert that all the funds have been unblocked, while on other occasions, their remarks suggest a different outcome.

The conflict between various statements is at times observed in the remarks of the same official in a matter of a few minutes. During his news conference Tuesday, President Ebrahim Raisi contradicted himself on the status of the funds.

When a Japanese reporter asked Raisi's opinion about $1.5 billion of Iranian assets in Japan, Raisi said in vague terms: "As we have declared earlier, we would welcome any hand extended to us as a sign of friendship but will cut off the hands of hostile countries." He added, "As regards the money you spoke about, one of the things we have done in my government was securing the release of our frozen assets. This is on our agenda in the area of foreign policy."

Raisi reiterated, "We would like to suggest to Japan to be independent and not be influenced by the Americans. We call on Japan not to freeze in any way any money we might have in that country, whether it is the price of goods we sold, or it is left in Japan as a trust."

Some pro-government agencies such as the IRGC-linked news agency Tasnim first reported this part of Raisi's statement, which indicated there are frozen funds in Japan. But later Tasnim retracted it and replaced it with Rais insisting on not having any frozen assets in any foreign country.

A few minutes later, Raisi reversed himself while the news conference was still in progress that "We do not have any problems with Japan. The only country where our money was frozen in an oppressive way was South Korea. Our assets everywhere else are at the disposal of the Central Bank of Iran."

This, and remarks by Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in day earlier, indicate that Iran has possibly been assured by the United States that Washington has already agreed, or will soon agree to approve the release of all of Iran’s frozen funds.

So far, the United States has confirmed that it has approved the release of around $2.7 billion from Iraq and $6 billion from South Korea, but there has been no clarity about another $8 billion in Iraqi banks and up to $3 billion in Japan. In exchange, Iran has agreed to eventually release five US hostages kept in Tehran.

The official Iranian news agency IRNA on Monday quoted Amir-Abdollahian as saying, "Iran has no frozen assets in any country." He added that "Iran can now use the assets it has at its disposal." However, the Iranian Foreign Minister denied humiliating reports that said Iran was allowed to use its released assets in South Korea within the frameworks of an oil-for-food scheme under the supervision of the United States.

Amir-Abdollahian said, "The reports about oil for food are not true." Meanwhile, speaking about Iran's assets in Iraq, he said our assets at the TBI Bank of Iraq are constantly on the rise, which was a vague statement. The released funds from Iraq are supposed to be transferred to Oman from where they could be spent on Iran’s humanitarian purchases around the world.

The Foreign Minister also added that "oil for food" also does not apply to the £390 million Iran has received from the United Kingdom as London's debts to Iran dating back to the years before the 1979 Islamic revolution. Earlier reports had said that the money would be held in Oman and spent to buy food and medicine for Iran by Omani authorities.

Former Central Bank Governor Abdolnasser Hemmati said in a series of tweets about Amir-Abdollahian's statements that "If what the foreign minister says is true, it means that Iran now has several billion dollars of hard currency at its disposal." This then raises the question of why the Iranian currency does not rebound from the almost historic low of 490,000 per US dollar.