Trump: I have never come to terms with Obama's cash payment to Iran

Donald Trump, the President of the United States, once again criticized the cash payment made by Barack Obama's administration to Iran, stating that he has never come to terms with it. In a tweet, Mr. Trump wrote: 'I have never come to terms with the fact that Obama was able to send $1.7 billion in cash to Iran and no one in Congress, the FBI, or the Justice Department wanted to investigate this!' This tweet was published on the second anniversary of the payment from Washington to Tehran. The Obama administration sent this amount in cash and non-American currencies by plane to Iran in February 2016. The former U.S. government argued that this money was paid to settle a legal dispute between Tehran and Washington over a military deal from the Shah's era. The American newspaper Wall Street Journal reported on September 7, 2016, that $1.3 billion in interest from the delayed military contract between Iran and the U.S. was paid to the Islamic Republic in two cash shipments. According to this report, the mentioned amount was sent from Europe to Iran on February 21 and February 5, 2016. $400 million related to the principal amount of the contract was also sent in euros, Swiss francs, and other foreign currencies on January 7, 2016, in wooden boxes by a cargo plane from Switzerland to Iran. This payment coincided with the day the Islamic Republic of Iran released four Iranian-American prisoners. The Obama administration eventually acknowledged that the payment was halted until the Iranian-American prisoners were freed and left Iran. Congressional Republicans assessed this payment as a 'ransom' from the U.S. to Iran, but the Obama administration rejected this claim. Republicans stated that cash payments are untraceable and are now in the hands of a country that tops the list of state sponsors of terrorism, which means the mentioned money could be used to finance terrorism worldwide. The Obama administration had previously stated that due to sanctions against Iran, it was unable to pay the principal and interest of the debt to Tehran through banking channels. These developments occurred after Iran and the P5+1 group reached an agreement in July 2015 in Vienna to resolve the Islamic Republic's nuclear program, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Under the JCPOA, Tehran agreed to halt many of its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting or suspension of international sanctions against Iran. Donald Trump is a main opponent of this agreement and announced on January 12, 2018, that he would extend the suspension of sanctions against Iran under the JCPOA for the last time unless the 'disastrous flaws' of this agreement were resolved through negotiations within four months. The conditions he set for the continued U.S. participation in the JCPOA include inspections of all Iranian sites requested by international inspectors, guarantees against approaching nuclear weapons, the permanence of the JCPOA, and restrictions on Iran's long-range missile program; as Mr. Trump stated, long-range missiles and Iran's nuclear weapons program are 'inseparable.' Rex Tillerson, the U.S. Secretary of State, announced on January 27 that joint working groups of the European Union and the U.S. had begun working to address these flaws. Iranian officials have stated that they are not willing to negotiate on this matter and will not accept any changes to the JCPOA.