Iran says American detainee has been released

New York Times: Iran has released on bail a fourth Iranian-American national who had been jailed since May on security-related charges, the ISNA news agency reported today. The New York Times

By NAZILA FATHI
Published: September 26, 2007

TEHRAN, Sept. 25 — Iran has released on bail a fourth Iranian-American national who had been jailed since May on security-related charges, the ISNA news agency reported today.

Ali Shakeri, 59, a California-based peace activist and businessman, was released on Monday night after his family posted a bail of about $107,000, ISNA reported. The news agency said that Mr. Shakeri still needed permission from his judge to leave the country.

Mr. Shakeri was the last of four Iranian-Americans who had been put in jail in May to be freed. Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East Program of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and Kian Tajbakhsh, an urban planner with ties to Open Society Institute of the Soros Foundation, had been arrested on security related charges.

Another Iranian-American, Parnaz Azima, a journalist for the American-financed Radio Farda, had been prevented from leaving the country.

Mr. Shakeri, a member of the Center for Citizen Peacebuilding at the University of California, Irvine, had been held in Evin Prison.

His release coincided with the trip to New York of the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to address the United Nations General Assembly.

In a question-and-answer session after a speech at Columbia University in New York on Monday, Mr. Ahmadinejad faced criticism for lack of freedom in Iran and his comments about Israel.