SHORT v IRAN

Iran- US Claims Tribunal

1987
Gyrsyl Jaisa A. Guerrero
 IRAN
1501- Feb. 11, 1979
O Alfred Short and Lockheed
O 1977- start of backlash
O Claimant evacuated on company
order

Proclamation of Revolution
(Feb.11, 1979- )

ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF
IRAN
April 1, 1979
• Action for Compensation for
salary and other losses
Iran- US tribunal dismissed the case.
Where a revolution leads to the establishment of a new
government the following rules on state responsibilities are
to be considered:

1. State is held responsible for the acts of the overthrown

government insofar as the latter maintained control of
the situation.
2. The successor government is also held responsible for
the acts imputable to the revolutionary movement which
established it, even if those acts occurred prior to its
establishment, as a consequence of the continuity
existing between the new organization of the State and
the organization of the revolutionary movement.
Iran- US tribunal dismissed the case.

1. State is held responsible for the acts of the

overthrown government insofar as the latter
maintained control of the situation.

As a result of this turmoil, the successive

governments lost control over events and the last
of them was eventually overthrown.
Iran- US tribunal dismissed the case.

2. The successor government is also held responsible

for the acts imputable to the revolutionary movement
which established it, even if those acts occurred prior
to its establishment, as a consequence of the
continuity existing between the new organization of the
State and the organization of the revolutionary
movement.

The Claimant departed from Iran a few days before

the proclamation of the Islamic Revolutionary
Government.
Overall, when Short left Iran, the revolutionary
movement had not yet been able to establish
control over any part of Iranian territory, and the
Government had demonstrated its loss of control;
hence neither the overthrown nor successor
government may be held responsible.
Short relies on two events which are
attributable to state:
1. Acts committed by revolutionaries
2. Declaration of the revolutionary
leader
 1. Acts committed by revolutionaries
i. Unable to identify any agent of the revolutionary
movement, the actions of which compelled him to leave
Iran
ii. US v IRAN is instructive
- The acts of supporters of a revolution cannot be attributed
to the government following the success of the revolution
just as the acts of supporters of an existing government are
not attributable to the government
- may be imputed only if it were established that, in
fact, on the occasion in question, the militants acted on behalf of
the State, having been charged by some competent organ of the
State to carry out a specific operation
2. Declaration of the revolutionary leader
Ayatollah Khomeini
1. “up to the dear pupils, students and theological students to
expand with all their might their attacks against the United
States and Israel, so they may force the United States to return
the deposed and criminal Shah, and to condemn this great plot”
- of a general nature and did not specify that Americans
should be expelled en masse
- Declarations are not an authorization to revolutionaries to
act in such a way that the Claimant should be forced to
leave Iran forthwith
- no evidence that any action prompted by such statements
was the cause of the Claimant’s decision to leave Iran.