Iran has seized the sprawling American Embassy in Tehran on behalf of an Iranian businessman who was abducted 15 years ago in a bungled sting operation by US customs agents.

Arrangements are being made to value and sell the compound — prize real estate in central Tehran — at public auction to pay damages to Hossein Alikhani. The Cyprus-based businessman sued the US Government successfully in a Tehran court four years ago and was awarded $550 million (£270 million) in what remains the first lawsuit against America for supporting terrorism.

“The property has effectively been seized and is in my name,” Mr Alikhani told The Times. “I hope to return to Iran in a few weeks to arrange the auction.”

The defunct embassy, which now houses a detachment of Revolutionary Guards and an antiAmerican museum, has long been a potent emblem of the enmity between Iran and the US since 1979, when militant students seized the compound and held 52 American diplomats hostage for 444 days.

The US State Department said that it had not been informed of the new development. “Under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, even where there are no diplomatic relations, states have an obligation to respect and protect embassy premises from action such as has been indicated,” a spokeswoman said. “We expect the Government of Iran to . . . ensure that the reported threatened sale of the mission premises does not take place.” Mr Alikhani, 62, argued that his case would not complicate the diplomatic atmosphere despite the US-Iranian stand-off over nuclear developments. “It’s completely a legal issue,” he said. “They might get upset as a matter of principle but they have been up to the same thing many times with Iranian assets.” Mr Alikhani said that his action followed US court rulings that held Iran responsible for damages awarded to Americans taken hostage by pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon during the 1980s.

Mr Alikhani spent 105 days in a US jail in 1992 after being abducted in the Bahamas for allegedly violating American sanctions against Libya. He argued that the sanctions did not apply to nonAmericans outside the US. In his 2003 ruling Chief Justice Mansour Pour Nouri, of the Third Branch of the Tehran Public Court, accused US investigators of “kidnapping, false imprisonment, using force, battering, abusing and ultimately inflicting physical and psychological injuries”.

A writ of enforcement was issued recently requiring the US to respond to that ruling by paying or presenting a list of assets to be seized as compensation. When the US failed to respond, Mr Alikhani identified the American Embassy as its most valuable asset, which he estimates to be worth about $200 million (£100 million). He wrote to the Tehran Civil Judgments Enforcement Department on March 3 to “have the said estates transferred to me or otherwise hold a tender for the sale thereof”.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry has informed the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, which represents US interests, of the developments.

Ironically, Mr Alikhani is an advocate of improved relations between Washington and Tehran. He runs a nonprofit organisation in Nicosia, the Centre for World Dialogue, which organised a reconciliation meeting in Paris nine years ago between one of the former Iranian students who seized the US Embassy, Abbas Abdi, and one of the former American hostages, Barry Rosen.

Mr Alikhani’s legal action in Iran followed an unsuccessful attempt in a Florida court to sue the US for $360 million. He claims that US Customs set up a sting operation to arrest him after a Florida company reported his approach to buy spare parts for Libyan gas generators.

Hostage hell

On November 4, 1979 militant Islamic students stormed the American embassy in Tehran and took more than 90 people hostage, including 66 diplomats. They demanded that the Shah of Iran, who had fled to the United States, should be extradited to stand trial. Live pictures of the siege were broadcast on Iranian television, and Ayatollah Rubollah Khomeini voiced his support for the siege. The occupation lasted 444 days. Operation Eagle Claw, the US's rescue operation, failed and resulted in the death of five airmen and three Marines, and in April 1980, the US broke diplomatic relations with Iran. The siege was finally ended by the Algiers Accord on January 20, 1981, when the remaining 52 hostages were set free in exchange for the release of frozen Iranian assets. In 2005 5 former hostages claimed that the president-elect, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was one of their captors. Their claims were emphatically denied by officials in Tehran

Source: Times archives

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