Amidst the rising number of COVID cases in the United States, Iran has expressed willingness to carry out unconditional talks with the former on the possibility of a full prisoner exchange between the two countries. However, according to Ali Rabiei, Iranian government spokesperson, the United States is yet to respond to the request.

“We hope that as the outbreak of the COVID-19 disease threatens the lives of Iranian citizens in the U.S. prisons, the U.S. government eventually will prefer lives to politics,” Rabiei was quoted as saying by an Iranian news website Khabar Online. He also added that Tehran deems Washington responsible for the health of the Iranian prisoners.

Among prospective candidates for the swap is Sirous Asgari, an Iranian professor who has been detained in the U.S. despite being exonerated from the charges put against him for stealing trading secrets. Held in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement jail in Louisiana, Asgari had tested positive for the virus and his attorneys were informed of it on 28 April 2020, according to a recent report by The Guardian. Meanwhile, U.S. officials have long been pushing for the repatriation of Michael White, a U.S. navy veteran who has been detained in Iran since 2018. Although White has been freed from prison on account of medical furlough, he is yet to be given permission to leave Iran.

If the U.S. reciprocates interest in the exchange, it will advance to be the second such interaction between the two countries since the deterioration of their ties in 2018, when the U.S. pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal. Mediated by the Swiss government, the previous prisoner swap between the two countries happened in Dec. 2019, when Iran expatriated Xiyue Wang, a Chinese-American student who had been imprisoned for three years on charges of espionage and U.S. released Massoud Soleimani, an Iranian scientist who had been convicted of violating sanctions.

Written by

B. Abinaya, Intern

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