Of the several issues that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) dealt with in the recent Certain Iranian Assets case (Iran v United States), one of them was related to essential security interests. This dispute arose due to the United States (US) imposing various legislative and judicial measures against Iran because the former believed that the latter acted against the Treaty of Amity signed between the two countries. An important question before the ICJ was whether the actions of the US—blocking all assets of the Iranian government5—was necessary to protect its essential security interests under Article XX(1)(d) of the Treaty of Amity.