The Biden Administration agreed to an unbalanced prisoner swap with Russia recently, and now there is a new agreement to exchange prisoners with Iran, according to Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.
But some officials in the United States are saying that it is a “false” claim by Tehran.
“Regarding the issue of prisoner swaps between Iran and the U.S., we have reached an agreement in recent days. If everything goes well on the U.S. side, I think we will witness a prisoner exchange in a short period,” Amirabdollahian said. “On our part, everything is ready, while the U.S. is currently working on the final technical coordination.”
The State Department rejected the official’s claim and said that reports of an agreement were a “cruel lie.”
But a White House official said that the United States was committed to getting Americans held in Iran released.
“Claims by Iranian officials that we have reached a deal for the release of the U.S. citizens wrongfully held by Iran are false,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson said.
The Reuters news agency reported that there have been conversations about a prisoner exchange being “closer than it has ever been.” It also revealed that there are some remaining hold-ups linked to $7 billion in frozen Iranian oil funds under U.S. sanctions in South Korea.
“The logistics of how these funds will be exchanged and how oversight will be provided are unresolved,” the source said.
It was back in 2018 that former President Donald Trump ended a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and six power that was initiated by former President Barack Obama. Trump reimposed sanctions that have created chaos in the Islamic Republic’s economy.
There are several U.S. citizens who are currently being held in Iran, many of them have been charged with spying and cooperating with the U.S. government.
Tehran wants more than a dozen Iranian prisoners in America released.
