On September 23, 2015, a U.S. Court of Appeals (Court) upheld a decision in Harrison v. Republic of Sudan by the lower court ordering three banks to release Sudanese funds in satisfaction of a default judgment against Sudan. The case arose out of the al Qaeda bombing of the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden during a refueling stop in 2000. Fifteen of the injured sailors and three spouses initiated litigation in the United States under 28 U.S.C. § 1605A, the terrorism exception to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), arguing that while al Qaeda was responsible for the attack, Sudan had provided “material support” for al Qaeda. Sudan did not respond to the lawsuit and the Court entered a $314.7 million default judgment for the plaintiffs. In order to collect on the judgment, plaintiffs obtained an order from a New York District Court, requiring three banks to turn over Sudanese funds they held. Sudan appealed the turn over orders, arguing that the original lawsuit had not been properly served on its Foreign Minister as required by 28 U.S.C. § 1608(a)(3) when service had been sent via the Sudanese embassy in Washington D.C. instead of to Sudan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Khartoum. The Court rejected this argument, noting it “makes little sense from a reliability perspective and as a matter of policy,” because  “direct mailing relies on the capacity of the foreign postal service or a commercial carrier, [while] mail addressed to an embassy ‐‐ as an extension of the foreign state ‐‐ can be forwarded to the minister by diplomatic pouch.”  Sudan also argued that the District Court had failed to obtain an Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) statement or a Department of Justice statement detailing why no OFAC statement was required. The Court rejected this argument, pointing out that the government had previously decided that no OFAC statement was necessary in this type of case brought under the terrorism exception of FSIA.