UN court rules it can hear Iran's case against US

International Court of Justice says it can hear a case brought by Iran against the US sanctions imposed by Trump.

Elad Benari ,

International Court of Justice
International Court of Justice

The United Nations' highest court ruled on Wednesday that it can hear a case brought by Iran against the United States in a bid to end sanctions the Trump administration reimposed in 2018 after leaving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, The Associated Press reports.

Lawyers for the United States argued at hearings last year that the case should be thrown out by the International Court of Justice for lack of jurisdiction and admissibility.

However, the court's president, Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf, said that judges rejected US arguments.

State Department spokesman Ned Price said the US was disappointed by the decision, but stressed it came at a preliminary state in the case.

Iran filed the case in July 2018, a few months after then-President Donald Trump left the 2015 nuclear deal reimposed sanctions on Tehran.

A year later, judges in the UN's top court rejected US claims that the case should be thrown out because Iran had "unclean hands" due to alleged links to terrorism, and that the tribunal in The Hague did not have jurisdiction in the lawsuit.

Iran had claimed the case breached a 1955 "Treaty of Amity" between Washington and Tehran signed before Iran's Islamic Revolution.

Washington tore up that treaty after the ICJ in a separate case ordered the United States to ease sanctions that were reimposed on Iran.

Now that the court has ruled it can hear the case, it will likely take years to reach a conclusion, noted AP. Rulings by the world court, which settles disputes between nations, are final and legally binding.