The lawyer of detained Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian says her client should be freed in the wake of the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, Iranian media reports.
Both the semi-official Fars and Tasnim news agencies quote Rezaian’s defense lawyer, Leila Ahsan, as saying Iran’s new penal code also meant the Iranian-American journalist should be freed. Ahsan does not elaborate, but new laws in Iran bar those on trial for charges other than murder from being in detention for more than a year before a verdict.
Rezaian, held for more than a year, reportedly faces up to 10 to 20 years in prison if convicted in his closed-door trial in Tehran’s Revolutionary Court on charges that include espionage and distributing propaganda against the Islamic Republic.
Jason Rezaian, an Iranian-American correspondent for The Washington Post, in Tehran, Iran, April 11, 2013. (AP/Vahid Salemi, File)
Ahsan, in her comment to the news agencies, says the deal on Iran’s contested nuclear program, reached July 14 in Vienna, means Rezaian should be freed.
“Regarding the circumstances of the Vienna deal, we have called for an acquittal for my client to be issued as soon as possible,” Ahsan reportedly tells Fars, without elaborating. She reiterates earlier comments that she expected the next hearing in Rezaian’s case to be the last before a verdict is announced.
— AP
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