An Iranian source has said that the United States agreed to release Iranian frozen assets held in Qatar and other foreign banks; however, the US has denied the assertion.
A high-level Iranian delegation led by Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Speaker of Iran’s Parliament, arrived in Islamabad earlier today for talks with the United States, while a US delegation led by Vice President JD Vance has also reached Islamabad.
Reuters reported on Saturday, citing a senior Iranian source, that the United States had agreed to release Iran’s frozen assets in Qatar and other foreign banks.
The source, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, told Reuters that unfreezing the assets was “directly linked to ensuring safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz”, which is expected to be a key issue in the talks.
The senior source did not give a value for the assets that Washington had agreed to unfreeze. A second Iranian source said the United States had agreed to release $6 billion of frozen Iranian funds held in Qatar.
Meanwhile, another Iranian source told Reuters that the US had agreed to release $6 billion of Iran’s frozen assets held in Qatar.
However, a senior unnamed US official told CBS News that the claim was false.
He said: “The United States has not agreed to release any frozen Iranian assets.”
The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs has not yet commented on the matter.
It is worth noting that, according to reports, the $6 billion of Iranian assets were frozen by the US in 2018 and were expected to be released in 2023 as part of a prisoner exchange deal between the United States and Iran.
However, after the outbreak of the Hamas–Israel conflict on 7 October 2023, they were re-frozen by the administration of former US President Joe Biden.
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