French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that the former detainees in Iran, Cécile Kohler and Jacques Paris”are free and on their way back to French soil“, in a message posted on X on Tuesday 7 April, amid the conflict in the Middle East.
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“This is a relief for all of us and, of course, for their families“, added the head of state, thanking the”Omani authorities for their mediation efforts, the state services and the citizens who mobilised tirelessly and thus helped secure their return“.
Also on X, French foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot said he had spoken by telephone with the two former detainees: “They expressed to me how moved they were and their joy at soon being reunited with their country and their loved ones“.
After more than three years in detention, the 41-year-old French teacher and her partner, a 72-year-old retired teacher, were sentenced last October to twenty and seventeen years in prison respectively for spying, notably on behalf of Israel, then released in early November but banned from leaving Iranian territory. Since their release they had been confined to the French embassy in Tehran.
Diplomats worked to obtain their release and repatriation, in a context made even more difficult by the war in Iran, which broke out on 28 February. Jean-Noël Barrot had again spoken on Sunday with his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi.
