Frenchman is still imprisoned in Iran despite being exonerated: Lawyer
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Roshan Amiri
- . March 3, 2023
- . Update: March 3, 2023 8:51 pm
Benjamin Briere, a French citizen, was recently found not guilty by an Iranian appeals court, but he remains imprisoned there, according to his lawyer on Thursday.
Briere was taken into custody in May 2020 and given an eight-year prison term for espionage.
He is one of many foreigners who, according to activists, Iran detained as part of a hostage-taking tactic to gain concessions from the West.
Briere’s French attorney, Philippe Valent, said to AFP in a statement that an Iranian appeals court had dismissed all accusations against his client and ordered his release on February 15.
The section of Iran’s security forces tasked with maintaining the system, the Revolutionary Guards, however, “are keeping him imprisoned despite this statement of innocence,” he claimed.
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Contacted about Mr Briere’s position, the French foreign ministry stated that France “is pressing for the quick release of all French nationals.”
Briere, who is being held in the Vakilabad prison in Mashhad, in eastern Iran, is continuing a hunger strike he began a month ago and is “exhausted physically and mentally,” according to Valent.
The “arbitrary nature” of the espionage accusations against his client, which Valent had previously called “fantasy,” was “blatantly clear,” he claimed on Thursday.
Briere “was not present in the restricted and sensitive regions of the country and did not capture any images or recordings” of those locations, according to a copy of the appeals court order he provided AFP.
He was described as “just a foreign visitor” whose “personal items and equipment were not used for espionage,” according to the statement.
The verdict was for Mr Benjamin Briere’s acquittal because “there is not enough evidence to prove a crime,” it stated.
According to Valent, Briere’s family is calling for his immediate release. His sister, Blandine Briere, told AFP that “this situation is utterly unfathomable”.
She said that in the hopes that things would be settled amicably, the family had chosen earlier not to publish the appeals court’s decision.
