Iran frees Iranian-Canadian academic on humanitarian grounds: Qassemi

Iran says it has released an Iranian-Canadian academic, who had been imprisoned in Tehran since June for seeking to undermine security in the Islamic Republic, on humanitarian grounds.

“Homa Hoodfar, the retired professor of Canadian universities, who had been detained in Iran on certain charges, was released this afternoon on humanitarian reasons such as [her] illness,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi said on Monday.

He added that the scholar had left Tehran for Canada through Oman.

Hoodfar, a retired sociology and anthropology professor from Montreal’s Concordia University, was detained in Iran in June on several charges, including “collaboration with a hostile government.”

In his weekly briefing session on Monday, Ghasemi told reporters in Tehran that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his Canadian counterpart Stéphane Dion met in New York on September 21 on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. The sides discussed mutual relations, regional issues, and consular affairs. The meeting came as the two countries broke off relations more than four years ago.