Iran is trying to resolve the case against Iranian-American reporter Jason Rezaian “from a humanitarian point of view”, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Saturday.
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Iran earlier slapped multiple charges, including espionage, against the Washington Post Tehran Bureau chief.
Last week, Iran’s official IRNA news agency said that, according to a report on Rezaian compiled by the intelligence body of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, he had been “commissioned to implement the mentality of those U.S. senators who believe if the Americans would manage to restore the level of its relations to the pre-Islamic Revolution era, then the Iranian revolutionary political system would easily be overthrown”.
He is awaiting his verdict, which officials say has been issued but not communicated two months after his fourth and last court hearing. Tehran refuses to release clear information about the conviction, in keeping with the pattern of secrecy that surrounded his arrest, imprisonment, and trial. However, in July a USA official called this provision meaningless and said the United States would veto any suggested transfer of ballistic missile technology to Iran. President Obama and Secretary Kerry must address their safety immediately.
Baron said there would be an appeal, and Ahsan is expected to ask the court to release Rezaian on bail until a final resolution is made. So while authorities are unlikely to vacate the conviction outright, they may be holding back details of that conviction while waiting to determine whether they will have an opportunity to release him in exchange for Iranian sanctions violators. A few even claim to have violated the economic sanctions unknowingly, via a complex series of business dealings.
Obama was right not to link Rezaian’s fate to the negotiations.
Other steps Iran must take to meet the requirements of the deal include reducing the number of uranium-enrichment centrifuges it has in operation, cutting its enriched uranium stocks and answering United Nations questions about past nuclear activities the West suspects were tied to weapons work. It reveals Iran as a country where the most basic norms of justice are still grotesquely flouted and where taking prisoners to use as pawns is still regarded as an acceptable form of diplomacy.
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On Thursday, the news site Iran Wire reported that Iran just seized yet another American, an as-yet-unnamed Iranian-American businessman visiting family in Tehran, and sent him to the notorious Evin prison.
