Tehran tells World Court U.S. sanctions breach friendship treaty

FILE PHOTO: General view of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, Netherlands January 23, 2020. REUTERS/Eva Plevier/File Photo

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - Lawyers for Iran told judges on Wednesday at the United Nations' top court that by crippling Iran's economy, sanctions imposed by the United States in 2018 had violated a decades-old bilateral friendship treaty.

In an earlier case involving frozen assets, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), or World Court, ruled in 2019 that the 1955 Treaty of Amity could provide a legal basis for its involvement in an Iranian-U.S. dispute.