Morad Tahbaz, the British-Iranian man held in a Tehran prison, has been released with an electronic tag, the UK Foreign Office has confirmed.
He was due to be released with a tag at the same time as Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anousheh Ashori were allowed to return to the UK in March, but he was allowed to return to his mother’s home in Tehran just days before this he was sent back to Evin prison.
Tahbaz is the co-founder of the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation. In January 2018, Iranian authorities arrested him and eight other individuals associated with PWHF. He has American as well as British and Iranian citizenship.
In November 2019, Iranian justice sentenced Tahbaz to 10 years in prison for “contacts with the enemy government of the United States”.
It is understood that the Omani government acted as an intermediary in the release, as it did in the release of Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
An FCO spokesman said: “The Tahbaz family have confirmed that Morad has been released from Evin prison on leave and is at home in Tehran.
“Morad is a tri-national and we continue to work closely with the United States to urge the Iranian authorities to release him permanently and allow him to leave Iran.”
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It is not clear whether there was any exchange by the US or the UK that led to an easing of its terms. One possibility is that Oman or another foreign power agreed to pay a substantial bail to secure his release.
The UK has already paid off the historic £400m debt it owes to Iran, a move most observers say is linked to Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s release. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss refused to accept there was a direct link and said the two episodes were unrelated.
Truss was criticized for allowing Anousheh and Zaghari-Ratcliffe to be released without securing Tahbaz’s release, but she seemed to think the Iranians were adamant and that Tahbaz would be treated as someone whose future would be negotiated with the US . Truss said the Iranians had reneged on their commitment to allow him to be released on leave.
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