Overview
- President Emmanuel Macron said on November 4 that Cécile Kohler and Jacques Paris left Evin prison and reached the French ambassador’s residence in Tehran.
- Foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot reported they are in security at the residence and appear in good health, though not yet definitively free.
- Iran’s foreign ministry stated they were released on bail and placed under surveillance pending the next judicial step.
- The pair were convicted in mid-October of espionage and sentenced to 20 and 17 years, as France pursued an ICJ case over consular-protection violations and denounced inhumane detention conditions.
- Their transfer follows weeks of intensified diplomacy and public talk in Tehran of a potential exchange linked to Iranian national Mahdieh Esfandiari, who was released under judicial control in France.