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The US prioritized the release of Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian when entering into prisoner exchange discussions, according to Iran’s Fars News Agency.
On Saturday January 16, news emerged that Iran had released four US prisoners as part of a prisoner swap deal. Seven Iranians were released from prison in the United States. Among the Iranian-US prisoners freed in Iran was the Washington Post’s Jason Rezaian – a journalist who had been jailed for almost 18 months, and whose case had attracted worldwide condemnation from governments and human rights organizations.
Fars news agency, which is owned and run by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, said US officials released the seven Iranians primarily to secure the release of the Washington Post correspondent.
“Jason Rezaian was the main person who was freed on Saturday and the US agreed to make the concessions for his sake and not the three other inmates,” the news agency said, quoting Iranian analyst Mehdi Mohammadi, who according to Fars made the claims on his Instagram page on January 17.
“The US non-stop efforts to free Rezaian showed that he wasn’t just a journalist,” the analyst said, dismissing comments from Western commentators that Rezaian should be freed because he was simply a reporter who had been doing his job.
Mohammadi commended Iran’s security forces for “their timely reaction to threats,” according to Fars. He said their response gave Iran the ability “to force the enemy to make concessions.”
Fars News Agency reported that Jason Rezaian had been involved in a plot to overthrow the regime in collaboration with the US Senate, which an Iranian legislator had confirmed in October 2015. The legislator had according to the agency based his announcement on a report issued by the Revolutionary Guards.
Fars also said that some media outlets had wrongly reported the release of Iranian-US dual national Siamak Namazi. It confirmed that he remains in prison and that the charges against him are based on illegal financial dealings and not political crimes. According to Fars, Iran also released a fifth dual national, Mathew Trevithick, but not as part of the prisoner exchange deal.
The United States released seven Iranian prisoners in exchange. Fars listed the freed men as Nader Modanlou, Bahram Mechanic, Khosrow Afqahi, Arash Ghahreman, Touraj Faridi, Nima Golestaneh and Ali Sabounchi. It also said that the US had dropped sanctions violations charges against 14 other Iranians.
Iranian state media, the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), also provided extensive coverage of the release of the prisoners, which was announced by Tehran’s prosecutor. Iranian president Hassan Rouhani spoke of a “golden page” in Iran's history as the nuclear deal went into effect and sanctions were lifted on the same day as a prisoner swap between the two countries saw the release of four Iranian-US dual nationals.
According to IRNA, Tehran's prosecutor, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, told reporters that four Iranians holding dual nationality were released “in line with the ratification of the Supreme National Security Council, and the expediency of the Islamic system.”
But just as US and Iranian officials celebrated the implementation of the nuclear deal and release of prisoners, the US government imposed other sanctions on Iran, which Iran’s Foreign Ministry criticized, according to the IRNA.
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