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Four Americans freed in prisoner swap with Iran

VIENNA, Austria - Iran released Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaian and three other detained Iranian Americans on Saturday in exchange for seven people imprisoned or charged in the United States, U.S. and Iranian officials said, a swap linked to a landmark nuclear deal between Tehran and six world powers.

Secretary of State John Kerry en route to Vienna, where the IAEA certified Iran had sent the bulk of its enriched uranium out of the country, mothballed most centrifuges, and disabled its Arak reactor.
Secretary of State John Kerry en route to Vienna, where the IAEA certified Iran had sent the bulk of its enriched uranium out of the country, mothballed most centrifuges, and disabled its Arak reactor.Read moreAP

VIENNA, Austria - Iran released Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaian and three other detained Iranian Americans on Saturday in exchange for seven people imprisoned or charged in the United States, U.S. and Iranian officials said, a swap linked to a landmark nuclear deal between Tehran and six world powers.

Iranian officials said Rezaian, 39, was freed from Tehran's notorious Evin Prison after 18 months of captivity and was to be promptly flown out of the country with the three other released detainees.

U.S. officials confirmed the deal but were awaiting confirmation that a Swiss plane carrying the four has left Tehran. Iran also agreed to let Rezaian's wife leave with him on the plane, the officials said.

Iran's judiciary announced the release in Tehran as part of an exchange, according to Iranian news media. In return, the U.S. is releasing seven people charged with violating sanctions against Iran, U.S. and Iranian officials said.

U.S. officials said Iran is also freeing a fifth American, a student detained in Tehran some months ago, separately from the exchange.

A senior administration official, speaking in Vienna, said that the "Iranians wanted a goodwill gesture" as part of the release, and that led to the exchange. The list the Iranians submitted to U.S. authorities was "whittled down" to exclude any crimes related to violence or terrorism, said the official, one of several who spoke on condition of anonymity under administration ground rules.

Another official said that the exchange was a "one-time arrangement because it was an opportunity to bring Americans home," and should not be considered something that would "encourage this behavior in the future" by Iran.

The officials did not tie the release directly to the nuclear talks and said they had not wanted the detained Americans to be "used as leverage" in the negotiations. But, they said, completion of the nuclear deal last July greatly accelerated talks about the prisoners.

A senior administration official identified the fifth American as Matthew Trevithick. "Matthew was a young man studying in Iran" and was "detained in recent months," the official said. "We wanted him obviously to be a direct part of this, and made clear to Iranians that [his release] would be an appropriate humanitarian gesture."

Trevithick's family said in a statement that he went to Iran in September for a four-month language program only to be arrested and spend 40 days in Evin Prison. A researcher and author, he previously worked at the American University of Afghanistan and the American University of Iraq.

Rep. Jared Huffman (D., Calif.), who represents the district where the Rezaian family lives, said he was told by the White House that the Americans would be aboard a Swiss plane that would take them briefly to Switzerland and that they would not return home until they have "medical checkups," most likely at a U.S. military medical facility in Germany. "We're all very excited that hopefully within a matter of days we'll be able to welcome them back to the United States," Huffman said.

In a statement in Tehran, Prosecutor Abbas Jaafari said that "based on an approval of the Supreme National Security Council and the general interests of the Islamic Republic, four Iranian prisoners with dual nationality were freed today within the framework of a prisoner swap deal," the semiofficial Fars news agency reported.

The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency, quoting Jaafari, said the agreement also includes a provision under which the United States will no longer pursue the extradition of 14 Iranians alleged to have been involved in trafficking arms to Iran.

In Washington, the State Department said clemency has been offered to seven Iranians, six of whom are dual U.S.-Iranian citizens, who had been convicted or were awaiting trial in the United States. "The United States also removed any Interpol red notices and dismissed any charges against 14 Iranians for whom it was assessed that extradition requests were unlikely to be successful," the department said.

News of the reported exchange came as world leaders converged Saturday in Vienna. They later certified that Iran has met its commitments under the deal it signed last July with six global powers, including the United States.

Those being freed Saturday included Saeed Abedini, 35, of Boise, Idaho; Amir Hekmati, 32, of Flint, Mich.; and Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, U.S. and Iranian officials said.

Not included in the deal was Siamak Namazi, a Dubai-based oil company executive who had promoted closer U.S.-Iranian ties, Iranian officials said. He was arrested in October while visiting a friend in Tehran. In addition, the fate of former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who disappeared in March 2007 during a visit to Iran's Kish Island, remains unknown.

Namazi remains incarcerated because "his charges are financial, and not political," Fars said.

Asked about Namazi and Levinson, U.S. officials in Vienna said that talks were continuing on their fate. "Iran has also committed to continue cooperating with the United States to determine the whereabouts of Robert Levinson," a U.S. official in Washington said.

Fars named seven Iranians it said were being exchanged by the United States in the deal: Nader Modanlou, Bahram Mechanic, Khosrow Afqahi, Arash Ghahreman, Touraj Faridi, Nima Golestaneh, and Ali Sabounchi.

The exchange quickly became political fodder in the U.S. among Republicans vying for the GOP presidential nomination.

Gov. Christie said in a television interview: "We'd be very happy for the families of the Americans who are going to be home and for those Americans, but I'd also want to hear what the other side of the deal is, if this president is releasing more terrorists from Guantanamo."

Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), told reporters while campaigning in Iowa: "This tells us everything we need to know about the Iranian regime. That they take people hostage in order to gain concessions. And the fact that they can get away with it with this administration I think has created an incentive for more governments to do this."

Huffman, the Rezaians' congressman, called the remarks "shameful." He told the Post that Rubio and other Republicans "would have said the same things" no matter what the circumstances.

The Americans Who Were Freed

Jason Rezaian

Rezaian, a reporter with the Washington Post, was detained in July 2014 when Iranian security forces raided his home and seized his wife and him.

Rezaian, who was born in California and holds both U.S. and Iranian citizenship, was convicted in closed proceedings last year after being charged with espionage and related allegations. The length of his sentence has not been disclosed. The Post and the U.S. government have denied the accusations, as has Rezaian. His wife, Yeganeh Salehi, was released on bail in October 2014. Rezaian was the Post's Tehran correspondent and was accredited to work in the country by the Iranian government.

Rezaian, who has covered Iran for the Post since 2012, grew up in Marin County, Calif., and spent most of his life in the U.S.

Amir Hekmati

Hekmati, a former Marine from Flint, Mich., was detained in August 2011 on espionage charges. His family says he has lost significant weight and has trouble breathing, raising fears he could contract tuberculosis. Hekmati says he went to Iran to visit family and spend time with his ailing grandmother. Family members say they were told to keep the arrest quiet.

He was convicted of spying and sentenced to death in 2012. After a higher court ordered a retrial, he was sentenced in 2014 to 10 years on a lesser charge.

His sister, Sarah, has said her brother renounced his dual Iranian citizenship and vowed never to return to Iran if allowed to leave. He made the comments in a letter he dictated to his mother by phone. "It has become very clear to me that those responsible view Iranian-Americans not as citizens or even human beings, but as bargaining chips and tools for propaganda," he wrote in the letter sent to the State Department's Iranian interest section in Washington.

"Considering how little value the Ministry of Intelligence places on my Iranian citizenship and passport, I, too, place little value on them and inform you, effectively that I formally renounce my Iranian citizenship and passport."

Hekmati was born in Arizona and raised in Michigan. He and his family deny any wrongdoing, and say his imprisonment included physical and mental torture and long periods of solitary confinement in a tiny cell.

Saeed Abedini

Pastor Abedini, of Boise, Idaho, was detained for compromising national security, presumably because of Christian proselytizing, in September 2012. He was sentenced in 2013 to eight years in prison. President Barack Obama met his wife and children in 2015. There are claims he was beaten in Iranian prison.

Abedini was previously arrested in 2009 and released after promising to stop organizing churches in homes. At the time of his arrest, he was running an orphanage in Iran.

Matthew Trevithick

Trevithick, a student, was released after 40 days of detention at Evin Prison in Tehran, according to a statement from his parents. Trevithick had traveled to Iran in September for a four-month, intensive language program at the Dehkhoda Institute, a language center affiliated with Tehran University.

He is cofounder of the Syria Research and Evaluation Organization, a nonpartisan research center based in Turkey that assesses the humanitarian crisis in the area. Trevithick took a leave of absence from the center in September to focus on increasing his fluency in Dari, a language closed related to Farsi.

The last is Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, whose name had not been previously made public.

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