British Supreme Court ruling threatens Western sanctions against Iran
(Reuters) - Western government sanctions against Iran suffered a big setback on Wednesday when Britain's top court ruled that the government was wrong to have imposed sanctions on the biggest Iranian private bank over alleged links to Tehran's nuclear programme.
The Bank Mellat case and more than 50 like it pending at the European Union's two highest courts have clouded the future of EU sanctions and alarmed Washington, which relies on European support to throttle Iran's links to the global economy in hopes of getting it to curb its disputed pursuit of nuclear power.
The British Supreme Court decision on Wednesday mirrored a January ruling by the EU General Court, which overturned sanctions imposed on Bank Mellat in 2010 on grounds that EU governments had failed to provide enough information to support their case that the bank had assisted the nuclear programme.
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The British Supreme Court ruling paved the way for Bank Mellat to sue Britain for damages. A bank spokesman told Reuters on Wednesday it was considering launching a claim against Britain that "could exceed 500 million pounds".
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/19/uk-iran-sanctions-idUKBRE95I18A20130619
and alarmed Washington.............aka put that in your pipe and smoke it.
