Ahmet Dursun
26 October 2023•Update: 26 October 2023
ANKARA
A Tehran court on Thursday ordered the US to pay $420 million compensation in damages to 14 Iranians affected by a botched 1980 US military operation to rescue 52 Americans taken hostage in the Iranian revolution the previous year.
According to Iranian state TV, the Legal Court of International Relations in the capital Tehran ruled in favor of the individuals affected by the US operation, Operation Eagle Claw, ordering the US to pay material, moral, and punitive damages.
Washington was sentenced to pay $420 million in compensation to 13 people who survived the 1980 operation – or their heirs or relatives – and one person who was allegedly taken hostage by American forces during the operation.
Iran, currently under a host of US and international sanctions over its nuclear program and other issues, has not had diplomatic relations with the US since 1980, after Iranian revolutionaries stormed the embassy and took the Americans there hostage, and the US is unlikely to obey the Iranian court order.
Botched hostage rescue
In April 1980, the US launched an operation to rescue embassy employees taken hostage in February 1979, amid the revolution that toppled Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the nation’s ruler and a US ally.
The operation, called Operation Eagle Claw, failed due to a sandstorm in the Iranian desert of Tabas and a series of technical problems encountered by US forces.
An accident during refueling led to the explosion of a C-130 Hercules aircraft and a helicopter, resulting in the death of eight American soldiers.
The operation was ordered by then-US President Jimmy Carter, now 99 years old and in hospice care, and is cited as one of the factors that led to Ronald Reagan defeating him in the November 1980 presidential election.
The hostages were released in January 1980, minutes after Reagan was sworn in as Carter’s successor.
*Writing by Alperen Aktas
