Argentina Releases Detained Iranian Crew Members of Grounded Venezuelan Plane

Iran’s Foreign Ministry announced on Tuesday that the Iranian crew members of the Venezuelan plane seized by Argentina in June had been released. “The Argentinean judge eventually … issued an order for the release of the Iranian crew members and the removal of their exit ban,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said in a statement on the ministry’s website. Kanaani said the crew was headed back to Iran after a four-month joint legal and consular battle by Iran and Venezuela to free them. A Boeing 747 cargo plane sold by Iranian company Mahan Air to Venezuelan airline Emtrasur had been grounded over alleged violations of US sanctions and on suspicion of ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force since it landed in Argentina on June 8.