{"id":90754,"date":"2020-11-27T07:12:07","date_gmt":"2020-11-27T12:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/?p=90754"},"modified":"2020-11-27T07:12:07","modified_gmt":"2020-11-27T12:12:07","slug":"auto-draft-342","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/2020\/11\/27\/auto-draft-342\/","title":{"rendered":"British-Australian Academic Accused of Spying by Iran Freed in Reported Prisoner Swap Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"VOA \u2014 SYDNEY – A British-Australian academic has been released from prison in Iran after more than two years. \u00a0 Kylie-Moore Gilbert was convicted on espionage charges, which she has always denied.<\/p>\n

Moore-Gilbert, an academic at Melbourne University, was serving a 10-year sentence in Iran for spying. \u00a0She was detained at Tehran airport in 2018 after attending a conference. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Accused of espionage, she was tried in secret and convicted. \u00a0She has strongly denied all the charges against her. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Iranian state media said she was exchanged for an Iranian businessman and two Iranian citizens “who had been detained abroad.\u201d \u00a0 It has been reported the men were linked to a plot to bomb Israeli diplomats in Bangkok in 2012. \u00a0Australian officials have not commented publicly on reports of a prisoner swap.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In letters smuggled out of Tehran’s Evin Prison earlier this year, the British-Australian academic said she had “never been a spy” and was concerned for her mental health. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Moore-Gilbert said in a statement that she still had \u201clove and admiration\u201d for the \u201cwarm-hearted, generous and brave people\u201d of Iran. \u00a0She added that it was \u201cwith bittersweet feelings that I depart your country, despite the injustices which I have been subjected to.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

She also thanked Australia for helping to secure her freedom.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said her release is long overdue.\u00a0
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\n\u201cWe are very happy; she is obviously very thrilled,” he said.\u00a0 “She is processing it all as you would expect. \u00a0She is on her way back to Australia and we put those arrangements in place for her transfer back to Australia. \u00a0She is with Australian officials, who are giving her all the support she needs. \u00a0There will be quite an adjustment for Kylie. \u00a0She has gone through a terrible ordeal. \u00a0The injustice of her detention and her conviction, Australia has always rejected.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Iran has imprisoned several foreign nationals and Iranian dual citizens in recent years, many of them on charges of espionage. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Human rights groups have accused Tehran of using the cases to try to gain concessions from other countries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Australia continues to warn its citizens against any travel to Iran because of a “high risk\u201d of arbitrary arrests.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VOA \u2014 SYDNEY – A British-Australian academic has been released from prison in Iran after more than two years. \u00a0 Kylie-Moore Gilbert was convicted on espionage charges, which she has always denied. Moore-Gilbert, an academic at Melbourne University, was serving a 10-year sentence in Iran for spying. \u00a0She was detained at Tehran airport in 2018 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":90755,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latests"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"en","enabled_languages":["fa","en"],"languages":{"fa":{"title":true,"content":false,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90756,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90754\/revisions\/90756"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}