'Islamic regime uses ordinary citizens and civilians as a bargaining tool for their own interests'

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00:00On Wednesday, a French consular official was allowed to go to Tehran's notorious Evin prison

00:07to visit detained French citizens Jacques Paris and Cécile Collaire.

00:14Some hoped it was a good sign that they may be released after more than three years in jail.

00:19But now they've been charged for spying, including charges of spying for Israel,

00:25which carries a death penalty.

00:27Emerald Maxwell has more.

00:30Till Tuesday, their families didn't know if they were still alive,

00:35following the Israeli airstrikes last week at Evin prison, where they were being held.

00:40Then on Wednesday, diplomatic sources said Iran had charged French nationals Cécile Collaire

00:45and her partner Jacques Paris with spying for Israel's intelligence agency Mossad.

00:51They also accused them of plotting to overthrow the regime and corruption on earth.

00:56All three charges carry the death penalty.

01:01They're terrified because not only are they still in shock over the bombings that they lived through,

01:07that happened just metres from them.

01:08Now they're caught between these two dangers, that they could be bombed again if the war restarts,

01:16and the perspective of the death penalty hanging over them.

01:19Collaire and Paris have been detained in Iran since they were arrested during a tourist trip there in 2022.

01:29Since then, they've endured conditions that France says amount to torture.

01:33Tehran has yet to confirm the charges against them,

01:37but the French foreign minister said Thursday that they would be completely unjustified and unfounded,

01:43as he raised the threat of sanctions on the Iranian regime.

01:46We have always made this clear to our contacts within the Iranian regime.

01:53Any decisions on sanctions will be conditional on resolving this major issue

01:58and securing the release of Cécile Collaire and Jacques Paris.

02:02Iran's Revolutionary Guards have detained dozens of foreign and dual nationals in recent years,

02:08often on espionage-related charges.

02:11Western countries accused Tehran of using them as bargaining chips.

02:15For more, let's go to London.

02:19Tara Congerloo is a journalist, author of The Heartbeat of Iran,

02:23and adjunct professor at Georgetown University in Washington.

02:27Thank you for being with us here on France 24.

02:30Thank you for having me.

02:32So, we were concerned in France over the fate of Cécile Collaire and Jacques Paris

02:38after that Israeli bombing that partially damaged Evin prison during their 12-day war.

02:47We get news of them, which is a sigh of relief.

02:50And then the next day, these charges that carry a death penalty.

02:53How do you make sense of this?

02:55Yes, an important story indeed.

02:59And if I may just add that over 70 people were killed in that attack

03:05that was called a symbolic attack by Israel.

03:08And so many of those killed were just ordinary civilians.

03:12I actually read an interesting story recently of this young mother

03:17who was there putting bail for so many, again, charged for petty reasons.

03:25And she was trying to put a bail for them.

03:29And, you know, so many stories we're hearing.

03:31And, of course, the dual citizens and dual nationals

03:34who for long have been used by bargaining chips by the Islamic regime

03:39to pressure Europeans and Americans.

03:44And, unfortunately, the story and the plight of these two French citizens

03:48are not unique and are not unprecedented.

03:52We have seen this before on many occasions.

03:55And, you know, again, with regards to French nationals,

04:00back in 2022, I believe, or 2020, rather,

04:04Benjamin Briere, who was a tourist, and Bernard Fallon,

04:10he was an author and academic, they were arrested.

04:13And they were released, you know, years later in 2023.

04:16So this has been a long strategy of the Islamic regime

04:20to arrest dual nationals as a bargaining tool

04:24to get what it wants.

04:27And the question is, what is it that they want right now?

04:30Could we point, for instance, to the phone call

04:34that the French president had on Wednesday

04:36with his Russian counterpart?

04:38A lot of the discussion was about Iran and the Middle East.

04:42Is that what this is about?

04:44Because it's not just the fact that they're being held.

04:46It's why they're being charged so severely

04:49at this particular moment.

04:51Exactly. And that's the entire point.

04:56Right now, there is a lot of pressure

04:58on the three European signatories of the JCPOA,

05:03of the nuclear deal, that being France, Germany, and England,

05:06to essentially trigger the snapback mechanism

05:10and restate all the UN sanctions

05:13that are in ways the harshest of sanctions, right?

05:15And France is, you know, put in the middle.

05:18And I think what Iran and the Iranian regime is doing

05:21is trying to put pressure on their French counterpart

05:24to perhaps influence England and Germany

05:31to not reinforce the snapback mechanism.

05:36So I think this really fundamentally comes down to that.

05:39I will say, though, the last 12,

05:41or rather the 12 days of war between Israel and Iran

05:45really ignited this purge on behalf of the Iranian regime

05:51to go against anyone and everyone they deem to be spies, right?

05:56And as often that we've seen,

05:58they're going after the most vulnerable

06:00and really those who are very unlikely

06:04to be part of any of such activities.

06:08And that includes thousands and thousands of Afghan refugees

06:13who are actually, as we speak, being deported back to Afghanistan.

06:19And I think it's quite important to bring attention and awareness to that

06:22at the time that, again, we are hearing of the verdict

06:26against these two French nationals.

06:29So there's the perceived threats on home soil for the regime,

06:35and then there's abroad.

06:36If you go to the history books,

06:38the list is long of Iranians killed in Paris, in Vienna, in Stockholm,

06:44in lots of places here in Europe.

06:49Right now, what's the capacity for the Iranian regime

06:53to go after perceived enemies after this 12-day war?

06:57Excellent point.

07:00And when you talk to Iranians in Iran,

07:02and I've been speaking to some folks actually today after this news,

07:06most of them say, you know, the real spies.

07:10And by the way, there is no reason to believe that Israel

07:14does not have the most profound intelligence, you know,

07:18within the various factions of the Iranian regime and government.

07:22And when you hear people, they say, listen,

07:24the Israeli intelligence is infiltrated in the highest levels of the regime

07:31and the government.

07:32And, you know, instead of the regime to be alert and aware of that

07:37and go after the real threat,

07:39they are going, again, after the most vulnerable and the most innocent.

07:43And you mentioned the, you know, the Iranians abroad.

07:46In so many cases, the dual nationals that have been arrested

07:51were used, again, as a tool, as a human tool

07:55to have the Iranian regime detainees abroad released.

08:02And again, another case of that is actually a friend of mine,

08:06Olivier van der Kessel,

08:08so a Belgian citizen who was arrested for no reason.

08:12He was a humanitarian, an aid worker, and after many years,

08:16he was released in exchange for the Belgian government

08:19to release an Iranian convicted terrorist.

08:23So, again, it goes back to how the Islamic regime,

08:27for over the many years that we've seen,

08:29uses people, ordinary citizens and civilians,

08:33as a bargaining tool for their own interest.

08:38The U.S. State Department on Wednesday reiterating their advice

08:43to their compatriots not to go to Iran on vacation.

08:48There are still people who would like to go to Iran on vacation.

08:54I mean, quite frankly,

08:56I'm not sure if an ordinary American would want to go to Iran on holiday.

09:02However, there are many dual nationals,

09:06dual Iranian Americans, British Iranians, French Iranians.

09:11And we have to understand that, you know,

09:14the tensions between the Islamic regime of Iran and the West,

09:17that be of Europe or the United States,

09:20affects ordinary lives, affects ordinary people.

09:24You have families that are torn apart because of these threats,

09:29because of these arbitrary behaviors that really have no rhyme or reason,

09:36except, again, preserving the interest of the regime.

09:40And it's affecting ordinary civilians, ordinary people.

09:44There are students, you know, business people,

09:47folks who are active in the arts, culture, music.

09:50They can't go back to Iran because they're afraid

09:53simply because they hold another passport.

09:55And that has long affected families, livelihoods.

10:00And it's, again, to the detriment of exchange

10:04between a vibrant society that is, you know,

10:0890 million Iranian people and a huge diaspora,

10:11and also citizens of European countries and the United States

10:14who want to go to Iran and engage with the people of Iran,

10:18but, again, are being held back by these, you know,

10:22backward and brutal policies and behavior of the Islamic regime.

10:28So, as always, as usual, it's the ordinary citizens

10:31who are ultimately being affected.

10:34And we have breaking news on this.

10:35France's president says he's going to call his Iranian counterpart

10:38and does not rule out retaliatory measures.

10:42Tara Kangaloo, many thanks for joining us from London.

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