Hekmati, 32, is a retired Marine who served in Iraq.
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Abedini is a Christian pastor who had been imprisoned since July 2012 for organizing home churches. One, for example, appears to have willfully broken the law, but a law that changed three weeks after he pled guilty. But Tehran does not recognize dual citizenship and treated the cases as internal security matters.
A fifth American, identified as Matthew Trevitick, was also to be released as part of a different process.
“Iran has also committed to continue co-operating with the United States to determine the whereabouts of Robert Levinson”, the official said.
Saboonchi, 35, was convicted in 2014 of exporting industrial products to Iran though companies in China and the United Arab Emirates.
The prisoner exchange likely would have been approved by Iran’s highest authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The naturalized United States citizen lived in Staten Island, N.Y.
Asked whether Obama was involved in the decision to delay the sanctions, a senior USA administration official said: “This absolutely requires the president’s approval and this is something he was briefed on regularly over many months”. Iranian officials deny knowing where he is. The case has been on hold since October as the ramifications of the pending trade deal became clearer.
Based on the prisoner swap deal, seven Iranians in the prisons of the United Sates will also be released, the source was quoted as saying.
Certification by the IAEA would allow Iran to immediately recoup some $100 billion in assets frozen overseas.
The announcement of the exchange came shortly before Iran was certified as having met all commitments under the nuclear deal with six world powers. “Respect works. Through respect, through dialogue, through negotiations, we can in fact reach mutually acceptable solutions”.
In public comments, Obama had insisted as recently as mid-December that linking the Americans’ fate directly to the nuclear negotiations would have encouraged the Iranians to seek additional concessions. She said she began to have more hope after Secretary of State John Kerry urged her husband’s release in 2013.
A Washington Post spokeswoman said the newspaper had not yet received official confirmation of Rezaian’s release.
Only one of the Americans newly freed had departed Iran, the officials said. The seven were accused or convicted of violating USA sanctions. “We whittled down the list to exclude anyone that was charged with crime related to violence, with terrorism”.
Administration officials disagreed, stressing: “This was a unique circumstance”.
Trevithick, the student from Hingham, Mass., went to Iran in September for a four-month language program at an institute associated with Tehran University, his family said in a statement.
The Washington Post welcomed Iran’s release of its reporter Jason Rezaian in a message from its publisher Frederick Ryan.
“Once we receive more details and can confirm Jason has safely left Iran, we will have more to share”, he added.
His employer, family and lawyer maintained that Rezaian engaged exclusively in legitimate and legal journalistic activities.
The CIA conducted an internal inquiry into Levinson’s unauthorized relationship with the agency’s analytical division, resulting in three officials being fired and several more being disciplined, officials have said.
“For all the bluster and bombast fashionable in some quarters, today’s events underscore how important and-under-appreciated-diplomacy is”, said David Axelrod, a long-time Obama advisor.
Relatives of the other freed Americans expressed cautious relief Saturday.
“This is an answer to prayer, and we praise the Lord for how He has worked”, said evangelist Franklin Graham, who pushed for Abedini’s release.
“The truth is we are both human, and there is very dark moments and issues in our marriage and our family that came to light at a very breaking point where I was under a lot of stress and I shared with friends and it came out on media”, Naghmeh said.
Naghmeh wants to say thank you to all of the supporters who always stood by them.
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“First, we are returning criminals back to Iran in return for freeing innocent Americans”. The battle is over, and now we can focus on the next journey, as a family, of healing and transition. After his arrest, family members say they were told to keep the matter quiet.
