Tuesday June 25, 2024, socialist senator Rachid Temal placed a letter signed by 79 senators in the mailbox of the Iranian embassy in France. In this letter, the parliamentarians draw the attention of the Iranian ambassador in Paris, Mohammad Amin Nejad, “on fate” of Cécile Kohler, Jacques Paris and a third Frenchman named Olivier, whose name is not public. They are “unjustly detained in Iran”they write.
“It’s a symbolic gesture” while the embassy refused to receive this missive in person, Rachid Temal told journalists on site. The letter will also be officially sent by post to the ambassador. “They are state hostages because they are French. And so we, France, must do everything so that they are released immediately”insisted Rachid Temal.
“A symbolic but very strong action”
On the eve of International Day Against Torture, the signatory senators demand that the conditions of detention of the three French “respect the international texts of which the Islamic Republic of Iran is a co-signatory, namely the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as well as the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations”.
Me Karine Rivoallan, ex-president of Saint-Brieuc and who is one of the lawyers who defend these hostages, was in Paris this Tuesday morning, for this “symbolic but very strong action. » According to her, “It is excellent news that elected officials are also defending the French hostages in Iran. In the current political context, where everyone is in great demand, it is important that they still mobilize for this cause. »
Read also: Release of one of the French hostages in Iran: “Magnificent news”, for one of his lawyers
“Very little information” on the hostages
Noémie Kohler, Cécile Kohler’s sister, expressed her serious concern about the state of her sister’s physical and psychological health. “We have very little information on his real state of health and it is very distressing”she stressed, explaining that the last call to their mother was on April 13, whereas until then the calls were generally spaced four to five weeks apart.
“The calls are very short, four to five minutes, and are under close surveillance. His word is constrained”she continued, expressing her great sadness at not having any information “comforting” to communicate to him about a possible release.
Cécile Kohler sleeps “on the floor”
Following three consular visits, the last of which dates back to February, Cécile Kohler’s family learned that she was detained in Section 209 of Evin prison (Tehran), one of the harshest with cells without window and a light on day and night.
The three thirty-minute outings per week are “sometimes deleted”she sleeps ” on the floor “ and she did not have the twenty books that her family had sent her, Noémie Kohler also said.
The senators request the intervention of the Iranian ambassador to obtain the immediate transfer of Cécile Kohler and her companion “from section 209 in which they are incarcerated to the political prisoners’ section, the rigor of which is less critical. »
