On Monday’s broadcast of “CNN This Morning,” State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller responded to concerns that the billions of dollars in money unfrozen by a prisoner swap with Iran brokered by the Biden administration could enable future pro-terrorist activity by the Iranian government going forward by stating that “Iran has funded terrorism for years and years and years, decades, in fact. And we expect that they will continue to do so,” and that’s why they’ll hold them accountable.
After playing a clip of House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX) saying that while he doesn’t believe the money played a part in the attacks on Israel over the weekend, it could finance future terrorism, co-host Phil Mattingly asked, “Matt, to that point, the idea of money is fungible here, this frees up the ability for Iran in terms of its terror activities going forward. What’s your response to that?”
Miller answered, “I think it’s important to just establish what the actual facts are. There’s been a lot of rhetoric…about this, but the facts, I think, are pretty clear. First of all, the reason Iran had this $6 billion in the first place, and this is Iranian money, is because the previous administration, the Trump administration, allowed this money to be paid to Iran and placed into accounts where Iran could use that money for humanitarian purposes. We have allowed the money to move to a different account in the state of Qatar, from an account where it was held in South Korea, where Iran will continue to have access to that money, only for humanitarian purposes, with strict oversight from the United States Treasury Department. So, there is no ability for Iran to use this for anything other than humanitarian purposes.”
Miller continued, “I will also say that Iran has funded terrorism for years and years and years, decades, in fact. And we expect that they will continue to do so, which is why, even as we allow them to have access to this humanitarian funding, which was already their money, and it was already in an account to where they could spend it, but were just unable to do so for some kind of technical reasons, we have made clear that we will continue to hold them accountable. As I said, we have imposed 400 sanctions on Iran since the beginning of this administration for its range of activities, including support for terrorist groups. And we will continue to take steps to hold Iran accountable going forward.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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