International
Iran Frees French Researcher In Prisoner Swap
Iran has released a jailed French researcher, in an apparent prisoner swap after France freed an Iranian threatened with extradition to the United States.
French President Emanuel Macron “is happy to announce the release of Roland Marchal, imprisoned in Iran since June 2019”, his office said on Saturday. Marchal is due in France later in the day.
France has for months demanded that Iran release Marchal and fellow researcher Fariba Adelkhah who were arrested last year on the charge of plotting against national security.
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Meanwhile, the Iranian judiciary’s news agency Mizan Online reported that Iranian Jallal Rohollahnejad had been freed by France on Friday. Iranian state television later said he was already on a flight back to Iran’s capital, Tehran.
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Rohollahnejad, “an Iranian engineer incarcerated for more than a year in French prisons and accused of circumventing American sanctions against Iran, has been freed today”, the news agency added.
The French Court of Cassation had on March 11 approved “the request to extradite Rohollahnejad to the US, but the French government freed him, changing this decision”, it added.
“Taking into account the cooperation of the [Iranian] judicial system’s intention to release a French detainee through reducing sentences, the French government” freed the Iranian engineer “in an act of mutual cooperation”, according to the report.
Iran has in recent months carried out prisoner exchanges with the US, Australia and Germany.
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