Iran parliament okays motion to challenge US

Iranian lawmakers on Tuesday approved outlines of a bill to oblige President Hassan Rouhani's administration to seek compensation from the US over Washington's "damaging" policies against Iran and its nationals, Press TV reported.

If the bill is signed into law, Rouhani's administration would be required to urge Washington to compensate for, among other things, its "misappropriating of Iranian assets frozen in the US banks under various pretexts", the report said.

In April, the US Supreme Court ruled that almost two billion dollars in frozen Iranian assets must be turned over to US citizens killed in the 1983 bombing of a US Marine Corps barracks in the Lebanese capital of Beirut and other attacks blamed on Iran.

The assets belong to the Central Bank of Iran, which has been blocked under US sanctions.

On Tuesday, Iranian hardliner legislator Hamid Rasa'ei also proposed a complementary to the bill that obliges Iran to "seize US assets" passing through the strategic Straight of Hormuz in response to the US hostile acts.

"If the US should seek to misappropriate the Iranian nation's assets, the strait must be turned into an insecure place for them and US vessels be banned from passing through it," he was quoted as saying.

Such a counter-measure would be both "logical and legal", he added.

--IANS

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