The head of French diplomacy, Catherine Colonna, on Wednesday urged her Iranian counterpart, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, to release the seven Frenchmen detained in Iranian prisons, according to a French Foreign Ministry tweet.
This request was made when the health of one of the “hostages”, Bernard Phelan, who also has Irish nationality, has seriously deteriorated and is causing serious concern for his family and the French authorities.
“Once again he demanded the immediate release of the 7 arbitrarily detained French hostages and respect for international law, and reiterated our condemnation of the repression” of the demonstrations, the ministry stressed on Twitter.
Among the seven French are Cécile Kohler, a teacher and trade unionist, and her colleague Jacques Paris, arrested in May 2022, the Franco-Iranian researcher Fariba Adelkhah, arrested in June 2019 and later sentenced to five years in prison for undermining security as well as Benjamin Brière, arrested in May 2020 and sentenced to eight years and eight months in prison for espionage.
Bernard Phelan was arrested on October 3. He then was traveling as part of his consulting activities in Iran for a tour operator.
The support committee for Fariba Adelkhah and Benjamin Brière is organizing a demonstration in Paris on Saturday to denounce these arbitrary arrests.
Source: BFM TV
