Iran said Sunday it had reached a deal with the US to free four American hostages in exchange for the return of $7 billion in frozen assets — but the White House immediately shot down the claim.
“Unfortunately, that report is untrue,’’ said President Biden’s chief of staff, Ron Klain, to CBS TV’s “Face the Nation’’ — soon after Iranian state TV reported the supposed deal.
“There is no agreement to release these four Americans,’’ Klain said.
“We’re working very hard to get them released. We raise this with Iran and our interlocutors all the time. But so far, there’s no agreement to bring these four Americans home.”
The Iranian broadcast cited an anonymous official when it reported early Sunday, “The Americans accepted to pay $7 billion and swap four Iranians who were active in bypassing sanctions for four American spies who have served part of their sentences,” according to The Associated Press.
A state TV anchorwoman later repeated the claim, even after the US denial surfaced, saying the Biden administration has agreed to the deal because of the president’s “urgent need to show progress made in the case,” AP said.
The White House had announced in February that it had “begun communications with the Iranians” on trying to get US hostages freed but has provided no evidence of progress since.
Iranian state TV also claimed Sunday that an agreement had been made with the UK to release one of its citizens in exchange for $552 million in frozen assets.
British officials did not outright deny the report, instead only saying that their government continues “to explore options to resolve this … case, and we will not comment further, as legal discussions are ongoing.”
Four American citizens are known to be held by Iran, including businessman Siamak Namazi and his elderly father, Baquer Namazi.
Siamak is currently the longest-held US hostage, having been taken into custody in 2015 for “collaboration with a hostile foreign government,” the US, his brother wrote in the Washington Post in October. When their father entered the country a few months after Siamak’s arrest to visit him in prison, the dad was held, also.
The other two US hostages are environmentalist Morad Tahbaz and businessman Emad Shargi.
It wasn’t clear which Iranian detainees held in the US were supposedly part of any planned swap.
In the case of the UK, Iran would reportedly release activist citizen Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who is accused of plotting to overthrow the Iranian government, in return for the money.
