Terry Anderson files $100 million suit against Iran for backing Hizbullah

WASHINGTON -- Terry Anderson, the longest-held American hostage in Lebanon, has filed a $100 million lawsuit against the Iranian government.

Anderson, 52, a journalist, has charged Iran with funding and directing the Beirut-based Hizbullah guerrillas who kept him prisoner for nearly seven years, from March 16, 1985 to Dec. 4, 1991. He was held longer than any other American in Lebanon.

Anderson was bound and blindfolded for the duration of his captivity. His lawsuit asserts that his captors were Hizbullah members, or Party of God, "a politico-paramilitary terrorist organization operating in Lebanon" sponsored and directed by Iran.

Anderson, his wife Madeleine Bassil, and their daughter Sulome testified before United States District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson on Tuesday on how the hostage ordeal affected their lives.

The hearing will continue Wednesday. Testimony on the role of overseas journalists will be heard.

Last March, Congress enacted a bill under a 1996 law allowing claims by U.S. citizens and their families against assets of foreign countries that sponsor terrorism - if the actions resulted in personal injury or death -- to collect on such judgements.

But so far, no money has been collected under that act. That's because the Clinton administration, while initially supporting the law, has declined to help successful U.S. plaintiffs collect.

Anderson said he hopes that may soon change.

"The Clinton administration is supposed to assist in finding Iranian assets," he said. "In general, they've said they're willing to do this. But there's still a ways to go."

Anderson's case follows several other cases.

In August 1998 a U.S. federal court ordered Iran to pay $65 million in damages to fellow American hostages David Jacobsen, Joseph Cicippio and Frank Reed, and the wives of Cicippio and Reed. None of the plaintiffs received any money.

The families of four men who were killed in 1996 when Cuban military jets shot down two unarmed civilian planes have also claimed damages under the act but so far received nothing.

Others who have filed under the act include the family of Alisa Flatow, 20, of West Orange, N.J., a student at a seminary in Jerusalem. She was killed April 9, 1995 in an attack on a bus in the Gaza Strip. Seven Israeli soldiers also died in the attack for which Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility.

The United States froze Iranian assets valued at $12 billion in 1979. Most of the funds, however, are controlled by the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, which decides claims against both Iran and the United States. The United States itself has jurisdiction over only a small fraction of the assets, mostly real estate.