Prisoner Swap
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US and Iran conduct prisoner swap with Tehran getting its $6 billion in frozen funds after months of behind the scenes negotiations
Authorities in Iran have released five American prisoners who are now en route to the US via Qatar, American officials told multiple media outlets on Monday. The US in turn set five jailed Iranians free and released $6 billion in frozen Iranian assets.
The prisoner exchange is the result of months of back-channel negotiations between Washington and Tehran, with the final agreement sweetened by the US instructing banks in Qatar and South Korea to unfreeze $6 billion in Iranian oil revenue.
“This money belongs to the Iranian people, the Iranian government, so the Islamic Republic of Iran will decide what to do with this money,” Raisi said last Tuesday in an NBC News interview. Asked whether the money will be used for humanitarian purposes, as demanded by Washington, he said, “Humanitarian means whatever the Iranian people need, so this money will be budgeted for those needs, and the needs of the Iranian people will be decided and determined by the Iranian government.”
Siamak Namazi, who was released during a prisoner swap deal between U.S. and Iran, arrives at Doha International Airport, Qatar September 18, 2023.
US officials told the New York Times that the five Americans took off on a jet from Tehran on Monday morning. After arriving in Doha, they will be handed over to US authorities and flown back to Washington.
The five Americans included Siamak Namazi, Emad Shargi and Morad Tahbaz, who had been sentenced to ten years in prison on espionage charges. The other two detainees wished to remain anonymous, US officials said. Namazi, a 51-year-old businessman, was arrested in 2015 and excluded from prisoner swaps under both Barack Obama and Donald Trump’s administrations. Shargi and Tahbaz were both arrested in 2018.
Tens of billions of dollars owed to Iran for oil and other exports were frozen in bank accounts around the world under US sanctions, after then President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the Iran Nuclear Deal in 2018. The deal, known officially as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was signed in 2015 and offered Iran limited sanctions relief in exchange for a halt to its nuclear enrichment program.
US President Joe Biden has promised to revive the agreement, but has thus far failed to do so.
Source AP/NBC/Nournews/RT
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