Zarif: UK conditioning Iran debt payment on prisoner's release amounts to theft

Foreign Minister said if the British government makes payment of Iran’s outstanding debt conditional on the release of the dual British-Iranian national, Nazanin Zaghari, it would be tantamount to stealing the Iranian nation’s money.

According to Pres TV, Mohammad Javad Zarif made the remarks in a Sunday interview with a Persian-language newspaper in Tehran, when asked about UK’s claim that Iran is taking Zaghari as hostage in order to force London to pay the debt it owes Tehran arising from the non-delivery of Chieftain tanks ordered by Iran's former regime.

Nazanin Zaghari is an Iranian citizen who is currently serving a five-year jail term in Tehran on charges of espionage for the UK. Iran’s intelligence authorities arrested Zaghari, who also holds a British passport, at Imam Khomeini International Airport in April 2016 as she was about to board a plane to London.

The 39-year-old Zaghari was arrested after it became clear that she had run an illegal course to recruit and train people for the BBC Persian Television, a channel Iran deems is an extension of Britain’s anti-Iran propaganda machine.

“Suppose that they pay us the money and Ms. Zaghari is released and leaves the country at the same time; is there any guarantee that British media would not then launch a campaign claiming that Iran only released Ms. Zaghari after its money was paid?” the paper asked Zarif.

“If they do this, it would mean before the world’s public opinion and even in Britain itself that Britain is a thief, not that Iran is a hostage taker,” Iran’s foreign minister answered.

“They have not paid the money that belongs to the oppressed Iranian nation. Therefore, they have no right to set any conditions for its payment,” Zarif added.

Iran’s top diplomat noted that extensive negotiations are going on between foreign ministries of Iran and UK at the present time in a round-the-clock manner to secure payment of the Iranian nation’s assets despite tough conditions caused by the deadly new coronavirus pandemic.

Zarif stated that the two countries are also negotiating prisoner swap, but emphasized that these two lines of negotiation are totally independent of each other and have nothing to do with one another.

SS