Supervisor Elham AbolFateh
Editor in Chief Mohamed Wadie

Iran Frees French Researcher Roland Marchal


Sat 21 Mar 2020 | 11:41 AM
Ahmad El-Assasy

The Islamic Republic of Iran has freed Roland Marchal, a French researcher who has been under imprisonment.

This is the culmination of an agreement between the two nations, signed Friday. France has decided to release a forced Iranian detainee on extradition to the United States, in exchange for a French detained in Iran.  Marchal will travel to France this Saturday, the Elysée announced tonight.

"Emmanuel Macron "is delighted to declare the release of Marchal, who has been imprisoned in Iran since June 2019," but "exhorts the Iranian authorities to release our compatriot Farida Adelkha immediately," a Franco-Iranian researcher still imprisoned in Iran," the French presidency declared.

Since June 2019, this French academic had been detained in Iran as had his friend, the Franco-Iranian anthropologist Adelkhah, to whom he had come to visit. For months France has been calling for their release since their trial started in early March.

Marchal, 64, a specialist in Africa and Adelkhah, 60, a Shi'a anthropologist, are both accused of "collusion to threaten national security," a crime punishable by two to five years in jail. Even the researcher is investigated for "propaganda against the system".

His help committee in Paris has always asserted their innocence and called for their immediate release, saying they are afraid for their lives because of their health. Concerns rose with the rapid spread of the latest coronavirus in Iran, one of the world's most affected countries with a death toll of 1,433 on Friday.

 Marchal, who was in his detention in almost complete isolation, was affected “mentally and physically," according to his lawyer.  Adelkhah is very weak due to a hunger strike, which she launched in order to alert her condition.