The United States has denied a report by Iran’s state-run television broadcaster that deals had been reached between the Islamic Republic, Washington and the United Kingdom that would see prisoners swapped and Tehran receive billions of dollars.
The official quoted by Iranian state TV said a deal made between the U.S. and Tehran involved a prisoner swap in exchange for the release of $7 billion in frozen Iranian funds.
Sunday’s announcement by state television, relying on an unnamed source, comes amid a wider power struggle between hard-liners and the relatively moderate government of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
The broadcaster long controlled by hard-liners has aired similarly anonymously sourced reports contradicting diplomats in Vienna trying to negotiate a return to its nuclear deal with world powers.
It wasn’t immediately clear if Sunday’s report represented another means to disrupt negotiations by Rouhani officials or sabotage any potential negotiations with the West over frozen funds and prisoner exchanges.
But U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price immediately denied the Iranian state TV report stating they always raise the cases of Americans detained or missing in Iran.
Price did not elaborate but added that they will not stop until they are able to reunite them with their families.
Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain told Newsmen that report is untrue and that there is no agreement to release these four Americans but that they are working very hard to get them released.
Tehran holds four known Americans now in prison. They include Baquer and Siamak Namazi, environmentalist Morad Tahbaz and Iranian-American businessman Emad Shargi.
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