An exchange of prisoners between the United States and Iran is taking place on Monday in Qatar, a country that has served as a mediator between the two nations, as dialogue has been very challenging between them. The exchange is contingent upon the release of six billion dollars in Iranian funds by South Korea.
Qatar has confirmed that unfrozen Iranian funds worth six billion dollars have been transferred to bank accounts in Doha, according to a source familiar with the details of the matter, triggering a prisoner exchange between the United States and Iran. A Qatari plane was waiting in Iran on Monday morning to transport five American prisoners and two family members to Doha, the source said.
Among them is businessman Siamak Namazi, who was arrested in 2015 and sentenced to ten years in prison in 2016 on charges of espionage. Among the five Iranians to be released by the United States are Reza Sarhangpour and Kambiz Attar Kashani, accused of “evading U.S. sanctions” against Iran.
In the eyes of some experts, this agreement, reached after very discreet negotiations, signifies a de-escalation of tensions between Iran and the United States, but it does not necessarily imply a potential agreement on the Iranian nuclear issue. Iran and the United States have a history of prisoner exchanges dating back to the takeover of the U.S. embassy in 1979 and the hostage crisis that followed the Iranian revolution.
There is no indication that the prisoner exchange would incentivize a reinstatement of the 2015 agreement on the Iranian nuclear program, which stipulated that Tehran would scale back its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions on its economy. The United States withdrew from that agreement in 2018.
