Iran, Sweden free prisoners in Oman-mediated swap

TEHRAN

Iran and Sweden have announced a prisoner exchange in which a former Iranian official was released in Sweden in exchange for a European Union diplomat and a second Swede.

Hamid Noury, a 63-year-old Iranian former prisons official serving a life sentence in Sweden, landed at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport where he was welcomed by family members and officials, state television footage showed.

Around five hours later, Johan Floderus, an EU diplomat, and Saeed Azizi, a Swedish national arrested in Iran in November 2023, landed in Stockholm.

"They are free and on Swedish soil again," Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told reporters, adding that the pair were reunited with their families.

"They have been through hell on Earth, and are now able to reunite with their loved ones," he said.

"They are in good condition given the circumstances."

Floderus, a 33-year-old EU diplomat, had been held in Iran since April 2022 accused of espionage, for which he risked a death sentence.

Following his release, his father, Matts Floderus, told Swedish news agency TT that the family "are of course terribly happy.”

State media in neutral Oman, which has acted as a mediator between Iran and Western governments in the past, said that following its mediation, the two governments had agreed to the "mutual release" of detained nationals.

"Those released were transferred from Tehran and Stockholm to Muscat today, 15 June 2024, for their repatriation," the official Oman News Agency said.

Noury was arrested at Stockholm airport in November 2019 and sentenced to life in prison in July 2022 for his role in mass killings in Iranian jails in 1988.

He thanked the officials and the people of Iran for his release.