TEHRAN: Iran has sentenced Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele for 12.5 years behind bars for espionage as well handing him 74 lashes, the judiciary said Tuesday.
Vandecasteele, 41, was handed multiple sentences totalling 40 years on a range of charges, but with the sentences to run concurrently he will serve 12.5 years behind bars, the judiciary’s Mizan Online website reported.
Iran arrested Vandecasteele in February 2022, and he has since been held in conditions that Belgium’s government has described as “inhumane.”
He was found guilty of “espionage against the Islamic Republic of Iran for the benefit of foreign intelligence services,” and given a 12.5 year sentence.
He was given the same sentence for the crime of “cooperation with the hostile government of the United States.”
Vandecasteele was given another 12.5 years for “money laundering,” as well as a further 2.5 years and 74 lashes for “professional currency smuggling to the amount of $500,000.”
The verdict can be appealed, it added.
Last month, Vandecasteele’s family said he had been sentenced to 28 years in prison, but it was not confirmed by Iran.
Belgium insists Vandecasteele is innocent and is being held as a hostage as Tehran attempts to force Brussels to release Assadollah Assadi, an Iranian diplomat convicted of terrorism.
Assadi, an Iranian diplomat who was stationed in Austria, was arrested in 2018 after Belgian, French and German security officers foiled a plot to set off a bomb at a rally outside Paris by an Iranian exiled opposition group.
After three years in detention, Assadi was sentenced in Belgium to 20 years in prison in May 2021.
Under a treaty Belgium and Iran signed in 2022, Vandecasteele would have been eligible to be swapped for Assadi.
But in early December, Belgium’s constitutional court suspended the implementation of the prisoner swap treaty pending a final ruling on its legality.
Iran sentences Belgian aid worker to 12.5 years for spying
https://arab.news/rzcmc
Iran sentences Belgian aid worker to 12.5 years for spying
- Vandecasteele, 41, was handed multiple sentences totalling 40 years on a range of charges
- With the sentences to run concurrently, he will serve 12.5 years behind bars
Syrian government foils Daesh plot to attack churches and New Year celebrations
- Bomber kills soldier in Aleppo, detonates explosives injuring 2 others
ALEPPO, DAMASCUS: The Syrian Interior Ministry announced on Thursday that it had thwarted a Daesh plot to carry out suicide attacks targeting New Year celebrations and churches, particularly in Aleppo.
The ministry said in a statement that, as part of ongoing counterterrorism efforts and careful monitoring of Daesh cells in cooperation with partner agencies, it had received intelligence indicating plans for suicide attacks targeting New Year celebrations in several provinces, particularly Aleppo, with a focus on churches and civilian gathering areas.
The ministry added that it took preemptive measures, including reinforcing security around churches, deploying mobile and fixed patrols, and setting up checkpoints across the city.
During operations at a checkpoint in Aleppo’s Bab Al-Faraj district, security forces intercepted a suspected Daesh member who opened fire. One internal security soldier was killed, and the attacker detonated explosives, injuring two others.
Daesh recently increased its attacks in Syria, and was blamed for an attack last month in Palmyra that killed three Americans.
On Dec. 13, two US soldiers and an American civilian were killed in an attack Washington blamed on a lone Daesh gunman in Palmyra.
In retaliation, American forces struck scores of Daesh targets in Syria.
Syrian authorities have also carried out several operations against Daesh since then, saying on Dec. 25 they had killed a senior leader of the group.
