Western countries have no coordinated strategy on how to bring home nationals held by Iranian authorities in a policy of “hostage-taking,” the US envoy for Iran, Robert Malley, said in Paris on Monday.
The issue of foreign detainees in Iran is “a tragedy shared by the United States, Europe, and other countries around the world,” Malley told reporters, AFP reported.
“Obviously, it would be good if we had a common policy... not only for Iran but all the countries which practice hostage-taking as a bargaining chip and for political reasons,” he said.
“This is not the case at the moment, and it is true that many countries are dealing individually with Iran,” Malley added.
“I hope that one day, hopefully in the not too distant future, we agree on a coordinated response. This really needs to stop,” Malley said.
He stressed that there were three American “hostages” and the US wanted to bring them back “as soon as possible.”
Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps have arrested dozens of dual nationals and foreigners in recent years, mostly on espionage and security-related charges.
Meanwhile, activists believe some two dozen Westerners are currently being held by Iran in what they allege is a strategy of hostage-taking aimed at extracting money or the release of Iranian prisoners from the West.
Malley was speaking after two months of unprecedented anti-regime protests in Iran over the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in the custody of the country’s morality police.
Amini was detained for allegedly violating Iran’s strict dress code for women. Although the protests first focused on Iran’s mandatory headscarf, or hijab, they have since transformed into one of the greatest challenges to the ruling clerics since the chaotic years following the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna had revealed over the weekend that seven French nationals are being held in Iran.
The protests sweeping Iran have been characterized by French President Emmanuel Macron as a “revolution” but Malley replied cautiously that “it is not my role to find the term to characterize what is happening in Iran”.
“There is a popular movement, deep, persistent, courageous, which does not seem to be weakening. On the other side there is a regime which uses brutal violence which we condemn, which we sanction.”
“This page of Iranian history, will be written by the Iranians themselves. It will not be written in Washington or Brussels or Paris or London,” he said.
Malley came under fire on Twitter in October after tweeting that protesters in Iran have been demonstrating for “respect” from the Iranian regime.
He later apologized and said: “It was a mistake, and I owned up to the mistake. It’s not something that I should do, particularly because it was viewed as diminishing the demands of the protesters.”
