A reporter for the Washington Post who has languished in a
Tehran prison for more than a year will learn his fate by the end of this week,
according to a spokesman for Iran's judiciary.
Jason Rezaian's
arrest had nothing to do with his being a journalist, Hojatoleslam
Gholam-Houssein Mohseni told reporters late Sunday.
He said many
foreign journalists were in the country and in many cases, they had been
invited by the government of the Islamic Republic.
His remarks were
reported by Mizan, the news service of the Iranian judiciary.
While asserting
that Rezaian's arrest had nothing to do with his being a journalist, Mohseni
declined to comment on the details of the case against him.
Rezaian, The
Washington Post's bureau chief in Tehran, was detained in Iran in July last
year, though he was not told for months of the charges he faced.
Prosecutors
eventually accused him of espionage and other offenses, including
"collaborating with a hostile government" and "propaganda
against the establishment," according to the Post.
Newspaper rejects allegations
An Iranian court held a final hearing in
his secretive trial on August 10.
"It remains
unclear even to Jason's lawyer what might happen next," Post executive
editor Marty Baron said after the hearing.
The newspaper
has rejected the allegations against him.
"Any
charges of that sort would be absurd, the product of fertile and twisted
imaginations," the Post has said.
The U.S. State
Department called the charges "absurd."
Mohseni said Rezaian's final hearing had been held, but, at the
request of his lawyer, the court has granted him the opportunity to submit a
written defense.
He said a
verdict would be announced by the end of this week at the latest.
Obama: Rezaian 'should be released'
President Barack Obama faced criticism
for concluding a deal with Iran over the country's nuclear program without a
pledge that it would release Rezaian and other Americans held there.
In a speech this
summer, Obama mentioned Rezaian and other Americans "who are unjustly
detained in Iran."
"Journalist
Jason Rezaian should be released," the President said.
Former
heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali, an American Muslim, also urged Iran
to free him on on bail.
"To my
knowledge, Jason is a man of peace and great faith, a man whose dedication and
respect for the Iranian people is evident in his work," Ali said in a
religiously worded statement issued in March.
Iran's human
rights chief, Mohammad Javad Larijani, told news outlet France 24 last year
that he hoped Rezaian's case would come to a positive conclusion. "Let us
hope that this fiasco will end on good terms," he said.
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