Relatives of US soldiers killed and wounded in a 1983 Beirut bombing have been barred by a US judge from seeking $1.6 billion in assets belonging to Iran's central bank and held by a unit of German exchange operator Deutsche Boerse.
US District Judge Katherine Forrest in New York said in a decision released on Friday that they could not pursue assets owned by Iran's Bank Markazi and held in Luxembourg because she does not have jurisdiction over the funds.
Clearstream Banking SA, the clearing unit for Deutsche Boerse AG , had argued for the case to be thrown out because US courts have no jurisdiction over funds held in Luxembourg with no direct link to the United States.
Victims of the bombing won a $2.65 billion default judgment against Iran in 2007 and have since pursued Iranian assets held in various accounts to collect on the judgment.
One of the plaintiffs, Lynn Smith Derbysire, whose brother died in the bombing, said they would appeal.
In a similar case in 2013, Clearstream Banking SA agreed to transfer to the victims $1.8 billion in funds owned by Bank Markazi that were held in an account at Citigroup Inc. in the United States.
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