Two Swedish men who had been convicted of espionage and imprisoned in Iran for taking photographs of military installations were released Monday after being pardoned, a Swedish lawmaker in Tehran said.
The men were handed over to Swedish officials at the foreign ministry on Monday evening just hours after a spokesman had issued a statement saying their release was imminent.
The two Swedish citizens, Stefan Johanssen and Jari Hjortmar, were jailed in March 2006 and sentenced to two years in prison for photographing military installations on Iran’s southern island of Qeshm.
When their sentences were announced last year, the Swedes’ Iranian lawyer Muhammed Hassan Azemati said they had taken the photographs, but ‘they have not done any action intentionally, and their actions have not been organized.’
According to Swedish media reports, the men had been working as construction workers at the time of their arrest.
“They were pardoned after requests from the Swedish authorities and their families,” the foreign ministry’s director general for northern and central Europe affairs Ali Baqeri said.
There’s been no comment from the Swedish government on the mens’ release, which comes amid tensions between Iran and the international community over its nuclear programme.
Via : MSNBC.com
