A spokesman for Iran’s judiciary has announced that Ayatollah Khamenei has pardoned 80 prisoners sentenced for security charges.
The Mehr News Agency reports that Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei told a press conference on September 23: “Some of these prisoners have been released and some will be released soon.”
Ejei added that there are still two more occasions when further pardons may be granted.
He also reported that some of the released prisoners were among those sentenced in relation to the events following the 2009 presidential election.
Last Wednesday, 11 political prisoners were released including human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, journalist Mahsa Amradabi and a number of other high-profile political prisoners.
Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, however, denied reports that the head of Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, has met with detained opposition leader MirHosein Mousavi.
There has been much speculation that Hassan Rohani’s new administration will finally achieve the release of opposition leaders MirHosein Mousavi, Zahra Rahnavard and Mehdi Karroubi, who have been held under house arrest for close to a thousand days.
