I was wrong, Trump admits

Donald Trump acknowledged Friday he was wrong in claiming to have seen secret Iranian footage of $400 million in cash being delivered to Tehran as payment for the release of US prisoners.

Trump raised eyebrows this week when he made that assertion and gave many details of what he said he saw in the film.

“Remember this: Iran — I don’t think you heard this anywhere but here — Iran provided all of that footage, the tape of taking that money off the airplane,” Trump said Wednesday at a rally in Florida. “Right?”

But that widely viewed footage is believed instead to show the moment in January when three of five American prisoners freed by Iran get off a plane in Geneva.

In a tweet Friday, Trump said this is indeed what he saw. It is rare for the free-wheeling Republican presidential nominee — known for making provocative claims — to admit making a mistake.

“The plane I saw on television was the hostage plane in Geneva, Switzerland, not the plane carrying $400 million in cash going to Iran!” Trump wrote.

The story of the seemingly cloak and dagger money transfer in an unmarked plane was broken this week by the Wall Street Journal.

In January, five American prisoners were released as Washington granted clemency to seven Iranians and withdrew arrest warrants for 14 others.

Soon thereafter, the United States helped airlift $400 million worth of Swiss francs and euros to Iran.

But President Barack Obama says the payment was not ransom for the release of US prisoners.

The White House has said it was returning cash from a 1970s Iranian military order that was not fulfilled because of the Islamic Revolution.

Comments

Understanding Prof. Yemi Osinbajo - Abraham Ogbodo

Abraham Ogbodo I am trying to understand Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, the Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Often, he speaks out of character. That is, he talks as if he is Vice President before he is a professor of law, even when I know that the latter comes first. The man wasn’t like this when he was the attorney general of Lagos State and a teacher at the Law Faculty of the University of Lagos. Then, his statements were measured and as a seasoned lawyer, based on facts. But today, Osinbajo is sounding like Adams Oshiomhole, a union leader, who by the grace of God, became governor of Edo State for eight years. The revelations about big thefts in the economy had come more from Adams than even Ibrahim Magu, chairman of the EFCC. It was Adams who said former petroleum minister; Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke alone stole 13 billion British pounds from the national treasury. That is like saying she stole in raw cash almost twice as much as the entire fortune of Alhaj...

Much ado about the foreign reserves - Nonso Obikili

I have received a lot of questions about the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) foreign reserves recently. The CBN has of course been touting the reserves growing from a low of about $24bn to the approximately $42bn it is now. The questions typically centre around why we are keeping so much in reserve when the economy is struggling, and we have poor infrastructure? Why don’t we use the reserves to reduce the poverty that is rampant? The question typically betrays a little bit of misunderstanding over what the foreign reserves are and how the entire thing works. Hopefully, after reading this we will have a better understanding of what it is and what it can and can’t be used for. First, what is the “Foreign Reserves?” It is the amount of foreign exchange that the central bank has at its disposal at any point in time. Some of this is in cash and some in other liquid assets, that is assets that can quickly be turned to cash. Some of this is in US dollars but sometimes it’s in other c...

Boko Haram’s campaign against education and enlightenment - By Landry Signe

Nelson Mandela once said, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” Boko Haram, the Islamist terrorist group originating from Nigeria is frightened by this enlightening power of education. Unsurprisingly, on Monday, February 19, the group, whose name often translates to “Western education is a sin,” stormed a girls’ school in the village of Dapchi in northern Nigeria to abduct students. Of the 907 schoolgirls who were in the school the day of the attack, more than 100 are still missing as of Sunday. Since it became violent about a decade ago, Boko Haram’s actions, through these and other types of bloody attacks, have resulted in horrifying consequences. Human Rights Watch estimates that Boko Haram has left at least 7 million in need of humanitarian assistance, 2.1 million displaced, and 20,000 civilians dead. Local leaders claim the number is significantly higher. Despite such causalities, it took Boko Haram’s massive kidnapping of 276 sch...

ATTENCAO

Search This Blog