Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Obama White House Freed Nuclear Smuggler In Iran Deal Trade-Off

(JTA) — The Obama administration’s January 2016 prisoner exchange with Iran allegedly involved dropping prosecutions against more Iranian fugitives than previously known, including a top procurer of material with nuclear applications.

Some of the seven men freed in the exchange were accused by the Justice Department of posing threats to national security. In addition, the Justice Department dropped charges and international arrest warrants against 14 other fugitives, Politico reported Monday.

The prisoner exchange was meant to secure the implementation of the nuclear deal reached in 2015 between six major powers and Iran that swapped sanctions relief for a rollback of Iran’s nuclear program, as well as gain the release of five Americans being held by the Islamic Republic. At the time, the administration described the seven freed Iranians as “civilians” accused or suspected only of “sanctions-related offenses” and “violations of the trade embargo.”

Politico said the “biggest fish” released in the prisoner swap was Seyed Abolfazl Shahab Jamili, who had been charged with being part of a conspiracy that procured thousands of parts with nuclear applications for Iran through China, including hundreds of U.S.-made sensors for Iran’s uranium enrichment centrifuges.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.