Kylie Moore Gilbert, Australian Citizen, Released
Kylie Moore Gilbert, an Australian citizen, was released on Wednesday, November 26, following approximately two years of detention. Images and reports published in official media outlets indicate that she was exchanged for three Iranian nationals who had been detained outside Iran for unclear reasons. Ms. Gilbert, who was detained in Iran approximately two years ago, was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment by Tehran’s Revolutionary Court in late last year.
According to Hrana news agency, citing Tasnim, on Wednesday, November 26, Kylie Moore Gilbert, an Australian citizen, was released after approximately two years of detention.
Based on this report, Kylie Moore Gilbert was exchanged and released as part of a prisoner exchange with three Iranian nationals who had been detained outside the country for unclear reasons.
The report claimed that the Iranian citizens who were exchanged for Ms. Gilbert were three Iranian merchants who had intended to circumvent sanctions imposed against Iran while outside the country.
Hrana had reported on Saturday, October 24, 2020, about the transfer of Kylie Moore Gilbert, an Australian citizen, from Qarchak Prison in Varamin to an unknown location.
Kylie Moore Gilbert was detained by Iranian security forces in autumn 2017 and transferred to a detention facility of one of Tehran’s security institutions. It is said that this university professor traveled to Iran in the summer of 2018 at the invitation of Al-Zahra University and the University of Religions and Denominations in Qom to participate in the seventh International Conference on Shiite Studies, but in October of that year, while she was at the airport to leave Iran, she was arrested by “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces.”
The spokesman of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in December of last year that Kylie Moore-Gilbert was arrested on charges of “violating Iran’s national security” and informed of her 10-year sentence.
Kylie Moore Gilbert had stated some time ago that Iranian security officials had offered her to work as a spy for the country in exchange for reducing her prison sentence. The Guardian and Times newspapers previously reported that this Australian citizen, in a letter written after leaving prison, rejected this offer. Kylie Moore Gilbert responded to this proposal from the Guards, writing: “I am not a spy. I have never been a spy and have no interest in working for any intelligence agencies of any country.” In her letter, the university professor stated that solitary confinement for ten months had “severely damaged” her mental health. She also added that she remained deprived of phone contact or in-person visits and feared that if her detention and current conditions continued, her psychological and emotional condition would worsen.
She was transferred punitively to Qarchak Prison in Varamin in August of this year. Ms. Gilbert was transferred on Tuesday, October 13 of this year, along with at least 15 other defendants and political prisoners from various wards of Qarchak Prison to Ward 8, which had previously been known as the mothers’ ward, and has since been held alongside 10 prisoners charged with common crimes.
Kylie Moore-Gilbert is an Australian citizen, an assistant professor at the University of Melbourne and an expert on political issues in Middle Eastern affairs and Persian Gulf littoral states, and is a graduate of Cambridge University. In addition to Australian citizenship, she also holds British nationality.
Source: Hrana
