Iranian War Criminal Exchanged for 2 Swedes, Including Diplomat, in Prisoner Swap
Iran and Sweden on Saturday carried out a prisoner swap that saw two Swedish nationals, including a European Union diplomat, exchanged for a former Iranian official convicted of war crimes for his role in the 1988 mass execution of political prisoners.
According to the country’s state-run news agency, Oman mediated the deal that secured the release of EU diplomat Johan Floderus, first imprisoned in April 2022, and dual Iranian-Swedish national Saeed Azizi, arrested in late 2023, for former Iranian prosecutor Hamid Nouri.
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In 2019, authorities first arrested Nouri while he was on vacation in Sweden. Three years later, the Stockholm District Court sentenced him to life in prison for his role in the mass execution of political prisoners, paramilitary fighters, and others as an official at the Gohardasht Prison near the end of the Iran-Iraq War.
International human rights observers estimate that the purge killed about 5,000 people, but the Iranian government has never fully acknowledged the executions.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson welcomed Azizi and Floderus when they arrived in Stockholm late Saturday night.
Speaking on the men’s unwarranted imprisonment, Kristersson said, “Iran has made these Swedes pawns in a cynical negotiation game with the aim of getting the Iranian citizen Hamid Nouri released from Sweden,” adding that the conditions the two men faced while in Iran were a “hell on earth.”
