Chapter 13 PEACEFUL SETTLEMENT OF DISPUTES Negotiation; Inquiry; Conciliation; Negotiation Release of American Hostages by Iran Warren Christopher, who as Deputy Secretary of State led the United States Government's negotiations for release of the fifty-two American hostages seized at the American Embassy, Tehran, in November 1979, summarized the course of the final negotiations when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on February 17, 1981, to discuss the Declarations of Algiers, concluded on January 19, 1981. Mr. Christopher stated that, while efforts to obtain the hostages' release had been pursued through many channels from the outset of their captivity, the immediate precursor of the negotiations culminating in the Algiers Declarations was a message received on September 9, 1980, through the Federal Republic of Germany, that a senior Iranian official wished to meet with a United States representative under German auspices. In order to authenticate their approach, Mr. Christopher continued, the Iranians had given an advance indication of the four conditions for freeing the hostages, which the Ayatollah Khomeini then publicly announced in a speech on September 12: "the return of the deposed Shah's wealth and the cancellation of all the United States claims against Iran, a guarantee of no United States military and political interventions in Iran and the freeing of all our investments." On September 16 and 18, 1980, Deputy Secretary Christopher said, he met at President Carter's direction with the Iranian official, Sadegh Tabatabai, brother of the wife of the Ayatollah Khomeini's son, who had German connections from former service as a press attache at the Iranian Embassy in Bonn; Foreign Minister HansDietrich Genscher had also been present at the meetings. Mr. Christopher continued his summary: The September meetings . . . were promising, but the outbreak of the Iraq-Iran war [on September 22, 1980] sidetracked our plans to meet again. Nevertheless, a special committee of the Iranian Parliament [the Iranian Special Commission to the Islamic Consultative Assembly], which had been set up to deal with the hostage problem at the time of the initiative in Germany, continued to function, and it made its report to the Parliament on October 28. The Parliament's resolutions adopted on November 2 amplified the four Khomeini points, although in an ambiguous and confusing manner. The Iran Agreements: Hearings before the Sen. Comm. on For. Rel., 97th Cong., 1st sess. (1981), pp. 33-34. Former Secretary of State Edmund S. Muskie, also testifying before the Committee, presented for inclusion in the record a summary report "of the events of the 14 months that were consumed by the hostage crisis". It consisted of eleven sections: I, Summary; II, Background; III, Admission of the Shah to the United States and Seizure of the Embassy; IV, The First Stage of Diplomatic Efforts: Setting Basic Principles (November-Mid-December); V, The Second Stage: Moving toward Sanctions (Mid-December-Mid-January); VI, The Third Stage: Development of a Scenario for Release (JanuaryApril); VII, The Fourth Stage: Maximum Pressure and the Rescue Mission (April-May); VIII, The Fifth Stage: The Buildup of Pressure and Diplomatic Activity (May-August); IX, The Sixth Stage: Intensified Diplomatic Exchanges (Mid-August-January); and X, The Future. Parts III-VIII detailed the various steps that the United States took in attempts to bring the Iranian government to the negotiating table prior to September 1980. An excerpt from Part IX follows: IX. THE SIXTH STAGE: INTENSIFIED DIPLOMATIC EXCHANGES (MID-AUGUST-JANUARY) By mid-August, after months of bitter political struggle, the necessary Iranian political structure for dealing with the hostage crisis seemed to be in place. The Parliament had been organized and Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was named President or Speaker [and] Mohammed Ali Rajai was approved as Prime Minister, along with a majority of his Cabinet. There were expectations that the Parliament would soon turn its attention to the hostages. The United States decided that the moment was ripe for more direct and intensive diplomacy. The first of a series of personal letters from U.S. officials to the new Iranian leaders was sent in August. In an initiative that originated in the House of Representatives, 187 Members signed a letter to Rafsanjani urging that the new Parliament give priority attention to the hostages. Speaker Rafsanjani's oral reply, while critical of the Congressional approach, held out some prospect for further exchanges. Accordingly, a second Congressional letter signed by Congressmen Gilman and Hamilton was sent on September 15. Throughout the crisis, the Administration had kept the Congress fully informed of developments. The President, Secretary, Deputy Secretary, and other officers met regularly with Senators and Congressmen to share assessments of events. The Congress clearly understood the difficulty and delicacy of the complex situation and was helpful and fully supportive of the efforts pursued by the Executive Branch to gain freedom for the hostages. The long months of the hostage crisis showed how effectively Congress and the Executive Branch can cooperate to protect the national interest. On their own initiative, the families of the hostages wrote to Speaker Rafsanjani on September 13, urging that the Parliament consider release of the hostages on humanitarian grounds and offering to meet with him for discussions. Like the Congressional letters, this one was read to the Parliament, but there was no response. The Secretary of State wrote to Prime Minister Rajai on August 31 and again on September 30. In addition, papers spelling out the U.S. general position on the basic elements of a settlement along the lines of the January six-point paper were conveyed to key Iranian leaders during September. In August and early September, it became evident that the political situation in Tehran was beginning to coalesce and lines of authority were becoming clearer. Concurrently, the view that holding the hostages was more of a liability than a benefit appeared to gain strength among the Iranian leadership. The early widespread support for holding the hostages was outweighed by the very heavy price Iran was paying economically and in terms of international isolation. The judgment that the revolution was more endangered than helped by the hostage situation seemed increasingly to be accepted. On September 12, Khomeini stated briefly in a speech on a larger subject the conditions that the Parliament should set for the release of the hostages. These were: Return of frozen assets; Return of property taken illegally by the Shah; A pledge not to interfere in Iran's internal affairs. Although broadly stated and not precisely defined, these conditions provided the structure for an agreement. An additional step was the establishment of a Commission in the Parliament to recommend to the Parliament the conditions for the hostages' release. In private contacts in mid-September arranged by the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany, we were able to clarify and explain in greater detail our position on the various conditions outlined by Khomeini. Further exchanges were envisioned to try to expedite the process in Tehran to permit the hostages to be returned as promptly as possible. However, before further exchanges could be arranged, positive movement on the hostage issue was sharply interrupted in late September by the Iraqi military strike against Iran and the outbreak of hostilities between the two countries. The Iraq-Iran conflict had two effects on the hostage situation, one immediate and one more delayed. In the short term, the Iranian leadership shifted its attention almost exclusively to the war, and its interest in a resolution of the hostage situation was concomitantly reduced. However, as the war continued, the costs of holding the hostages were starkly felt by Iran. The combination of diplomatic isolation, an economy severely strained by sanctions, the draw-down of financial reserves which were not replenished by much reduced oil sales, and the general unavailability of military resupply, all dramatized for Iran the high price it was paying for holding the hostages. Although the hostilities had interrupted the momentum that was building on the hostage issue, we continued to press for release. We attempted to reinforce those in Tehran who were arguing that the war demonstrated Iran's need to resolve the hostage crisis and end its international isolation. During October we sent a number of indirect messages to the Iranian leadership, which stressed that a resolution of the issue was to our mutual benefit and refined further the actions we would be willing to take in the context of a general settlement of the hostage issue. With increasing frequency as the U.S. elections drew closer, Iranian leaders spoke in more positive terms of release. Prime Minister Rajai visited New York on October 16-19. During the Prime Minister's effort to focus world attention on Iran's grievances in its conflict with Iraq, numerous interlocutors told him that Iran could not expect support from the world community as long as it continued to hold the hostages. Illustrating the importance to Iran of a prompt resolution of the hostage crisis, the Parliament's Commission completed its work despite the war with Iraq and reported to the full Parliament during the last week of October. The Majlis (Parliament) held several closed sessions without reaching a decision. When a vote was scheduled for October 30, hard-line members blocked the session by preventing a quorum. Finally, on November 2 the Majlis adopted the Commission's recommendations elaborating Khomeini's conditions for releasing the hostages. The Iran Agreements: Hearings, ante, pp. 19-21. See, also, The Iran Hostage Crisis: A Chronology of Daily Developments, Report Prepared for the Committee on Foreign Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives, by Clyde R. Mark, Foreign Affairs and National Defense Division, Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, March 1981. See, further, the Department of State monthly chronology of events in Iran or otherwise related to the hostage crisis, in Dept. of State Bulletin, Vol. 80, No. 2034, Jan. 1980, pp. 44-46; No. 2035, Feb. 1980, pp. 56-57; No. 2036, Mar. 1980, p. 61; No. 2037, Apr. 1980, pp. 47-48; No. 2038, May 1980, pp. 60-61; No. 2039, June 1980, p. 51; No. 2040, July 1980, pp. 72-73; No. 2041, Aug. 1980, p. 63; No. 2042, Sept. 1980, p. 56; No. 2043, Oct. 1980, p. 63; No. 2044, Nov. 1980, p. 55; No. 2045, Dec. 1980, p. 47; Vol. 81, No. 2046, Jan. 1981, p. 28; No. 2047, Feb. 1981, pp. 5, 9. And, see, Christopher, American Hostages in Iran: The Conduct of a Crisis (1985), pp. 2-4. This volume, published under the aegis of the Council on Foreign Relations, was the outgrowth of discussion papers originally prepared for a joint study group that was composed of members of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, members of the Council on Foreign Relations, and Foreign Service officers who had been held hostage in Iran. The Majlis resolution of Nov. 2, 1980, referred to, ante, was an elaboration of the four conditions announced by Ayatollah Khomeini on Sept. 12. For the text, see Doc. 373, “Iranian Conditions for Release of the Hostages”, American Foreign Policy: Basic Documents, 1977-1980 (1983), pp. 774-775. For comment on the Iranian demands by Roberts B. Owen, Legal Adviser of the Department of State during the hostage crisis/negotiations, see his Ch. 8, "The Final Negotiations and Release in Algiers", in Christopher, American Hostages in Iran, ante, pp. 297, 302-305, 307. Deputy Secretary Christopher and his negotiating team carried the United States response to the Majlis' resolution to Algiers for discussion at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs with four Algerian officials: Foreign Minister Mohammed Benyahia, Ambassador Redha Malek (the Algerian Ambassador at Washington), the Algerian Ambassador to Iran, Abdelkrim Gheraieb, and the Governor of the Central Bank of Algeria, Seghir Mostegai. The response, under cover of a note dated November 8, 1980, was discussed with the Algerian delegation on November 10 and 11, and afterwards carried by the Foreign Minister's three colleagues to Tehran for presentation to the Government of Iran. Its substantive portion follows: The United States accepts in principle the Resolution as the basis for ending the crisis, and hereby proposes the following series of Presidential orders and declarations in response to the Resolution. Each of the Presidential orders and declarations is to be made public and become effective upon safe departure from Iran of the 52 hostages. 1. The United States is prepared to deliver to the Government of Algeria a copy of a formal declaration signed by the President of the United States, in which the United States states its policy which is to refrain from interfering, either directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in the internal affairs of Iran. 2. (a) The United States is prepared to deliver to the Government of Algeria a copy of a signed Presidential order unblocking all of the capital and assets of Iran within the jurisdiction of the United States, whether located in the U.S. or other countries, in order to allow the parties to move expeditiously toward a resumption of normal financial relations as they existed before November 14, 1979. (b) An accompanying Presidential order will direct the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to make available to the Government of Iran all Iranian capital, assets, and properties held by the bank, amounting to approximately $2.5 billion. (c) An additional accompanying Presidential order will also remove all U.S. legal restrictions from an additional sum of approximately $3 billion on deposit with U.S. banks abroad. (d) In order to bring about the cancellation of all judicial orders and attachments relating to the capital and assets of Iran within U.S. jurisdiction, the United States is prepared to deliver to the Government of Algeria a copy of a signed Presidential declaration |