“My responsibility is that a story survives. You, your responsibility, it is engaged in the survival of three human beings”. This concludes an audio message spoken on the telephone and on France Inter by Olivier Grondeau, imprisoned by the Iranian authorities for more than two years. Aged 34, the French hostage chose to reveal his identity for the first time.
“You, who have the power to influence this matter, hear this truth. Cécile’s strength, Jacques’ strength, Olivier’s strength are running out.”he says in a statement over the phone, referring to his two compatriots Cécile Kohler and Jacques Paris, also detained in Iran since 2022.
“I am innocent. Everyone here knows I’m innocent.”
“I speak from my cell in Tehran central prison”he also said on another part of the message, this time broadcast on France Info. “I am innocent. Everyone here knows I’m innocent.”. “In my situation, speaking out is taking a risk”recognizes Olivier Grondeau, “but there is “risk”, therefore there is “hope”, and I have very little left”. After his speech and the broadcast of his message, the French hostage fears the “retaliation” of his jailers, in particular the cutting of his means of communication, or the refusal of his request for conditional release.
His release from anonymity preceded by a few hours the announcement by his family of the release of the German-Iranian Nahid Taghavi, after four years of detention. And it follows by a few days the release from prison and the return home of an Italian journalist, Cecilia Sala. Olivier Grondeau, whom his relatives present as a traveler who loves poetry, was arrested in Shiraz (south) in October 2022. He was sentenced to five years in prison for “plot against the Islamic Republic”, explained his mother Thérèse Grondeau on France Inter.
-Friday January 10, Paris summoned the Iranian ambassador to denounce the situation of “state hostages” French people detained according to her by the Islamic Republic. “Our demand for the immediate release of French nationals who were state hostages was reiterated with the greatest firmness” of Tehran, whose situation is “unbearable, with undignified conditions of detention which, for some, amount to torture under international law”estimated the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
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