Five US citizens detained in Iran are 'in full health,' says President Raisi

WASHINGTON - Five US citizens detained in Iran who are

expected to be swopped for five Iranians imprisoned in the United States

as early as next week are “in full health,” Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said on Tuesday.

As part of the prisoner swop deal first made public on Aug 10,

the United States has agreed to the transfer of US$6 billion (S$8.1 billion) in Iranian funds

from South Korean to Qatari accounts, where they can be spent only on humanitarian goods.

The United States said it will have “oversight” on how and when the funds will be spent.

“The money can only be used for humanitarian purposes and we will remain vigilant in watching the spending of those funds and have the ability to freeze them again if we need to,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters on Tuesday.

Allowing the five Iranian Americans to leave Iran would remove a major irritant between Washington and Teheran, which remain at odds on issues from the Iranian nuclear programme to Teheran’s support for regional Shi’ite militias.

“They are very healthy and, according to our latest information, they are in full health,” Mr Raisi told Mr Lester Holt of NBC Nightly News, in an interview taped in Teheran on Tuesday, the US television network said.

The five US citizens include Siamak Namazi, 51, and Emad Sharqi, 59, as well as environmentalist Morad Tahbaz, 67, who also holds British nationality, the US State Department has said, declining to identify the fourth and fifth Americans.

The five Iranians to be released by the United States are Mehrdad Moin-Ansari, Kambiz Attar-Kashani, Reza Sarhangpour-Kafrani, Amin Hassanzadeh and Kaveh Afrasiabi, according to Iran’s state news agency IRNA.

IRNA, citing Iran’s mission to the United Nations, said “some of the freed Iranians will remain in the United States while others will return... home.”

The prisoner exchange could take place as early as next week according to eight Iranian and other sources familiar with the deal, negotiated in indirect US-Iran talks mediated by Qatar.

The United States is on track to secure the return of the five Americans in the “very near future”, White House national security spokesman John Kirby told MSNBC, without giving a date.

“The arrangements have been done and the final action of swapping the prisoners should be finalised in the due time,” Mr Raisi told NBC, according to excerpts released by the network.

While Mr Raisi appeared to acknowledge the US$6 billion may only be used for humanitarian purposes, he said Iran would decide how the money would be spent.

“This money belongs to the Iranian people, the Iranian government, so the Islamic Republic of Iran will decide what to do with this money,” Mr Raisi said in the interview, speaking through an Iranian government translator. REUTERS