News / Politics

Five Iranians held in US prisons to be released Monday: Rights official

Monday, 18 September 2023 9:56 AM [ Last Update: Monday, 18 September 2023 10:52 AM ]

Kazem Gharibabadi, secretary general of Iran's High Council for Human Rights

Five Iranians held in US prisons for years will be released on Monday and two of them will arrive in Tehran via the Qatari capital, secretary general of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights Kazem Gharibabadi says.

“After a successful team effort, five innocent Iranian compatriots in American prisons will be free today and two of them will enter Tehran via Doha,” Gharibabadi wrote on his X account on Monday.

“The High Council for Human Rights, alongside the government and the judiciary, will remain determined to uphold the rights of Iranians abroad,” he added.

Earlier in the day, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kan’ani said that two of the detainees will return to Iran while one of them will join his family in a third country and two others will stay in the US.

The five Iranian prisoners were identified as Mehrdad Moein Ansari, Kambiz Attar Kashani, Reza Sarhangpour Kofrani, Amin Hassanzadeh, and Kaveh Lotfollah Afrasiabi.

They had been held in American jails illegally and under the pretext of violating US sanctions. Their release came under a prisoner exchange agreement with the US.

Officially announced on August 10, the deal will also see the release of five Americans from Iran’s prisons.

The prisoner swap followed two years of indirect negotiations between Tehran and Washington.

The Islamic Republic has emphasized that the exchange of prisoners is a completely humanitarian issue.

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