Belgian Political Prisoner Swapped for Iranian Diplomat Convicted In Bomb Plot

UPDATE: The exchange of Iranian diplomat Assadollah Assadi, serving a 20-year sentence in Belgium over his supervision of a bomb plot, for Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele has been confirmed.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Iran has released Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele, held for 455 days in Tehran’s Evin Prison, in a prisoner swap.

Oman, which brokered the exchange, did not identify the freed Iranian.

However, it is likely to be Iranian diplomat Assadollah Assadi, given a 20-year sentence by a Belgian court in 2021 for his role in a bomb plot.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian posted that Assadi was returning to Iran, thanking Oman for its “positive efforts”, but he later deleted the tweet.

Vandecasteele was given a 40-year prison term in January for “espionage”. Belgium’s Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne told Parliament at the time that the sentence, for a “fabricated series of crimes”, was leverage to obtain the release of Assadi.

See also Iran Sentences Belgium National to 40 Years in Prison

Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croo said on Friday that the aid worker was returning “after 455 days in prison in Tehran in unbearable conditions”.

Assadi was charged with overseeing a plan to attack a Paris rally of the National Council of Resistance of Iran.

The NCRI is the political branch of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization, which has sought the overthrow of the Islamic Republic since soon after the 1979 Revolution. It was banned in Iran in 1981, and was listed as a “terrorist” group by the European Union until 2009 and by the US until 2012.