An Iranian court on Tuesday sentenced Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandescasteele to 74 lashes and 40 years in prison.
THE COURT RULING
According to the verdict, Vandecasteele was charged with four offences — espionage on behalf of a foreign government, cooperating with the US against Iran, money laundering, and smuggling $500,000 into the country.
He got 12.5 years each for the first three offences and 2.5 years and 74 lashes for the fourth charge.
The court said Vandecasteele could challenge the judgement within 20 days.
Article 134 of Iran's Islamic Penal Code states that when an individual is convicted of at least three separate crimes that do not carry the death penalty, the person will serve the longest of those sentences.
— Kian Sharifi (@KianSharifi) January 10, 2023
Unclear if this applies to Vandecasteele.
OLIVIER VANDECASTEELE
Vandecasteele, 41, was arrested in Tehran in February 2022. Reportedly, Iran arrested the Belgian to swap him for Assadollah Assadi, a top Iranian intelligence official serving a 20-year jail term in Belgium for plotting a bomb attack on an exiled Iranian opposition group near Paris in 2018.
Tehran has claimed that Vandecasteele entered the country “under the cover of humanitarian efforts with the aim of spying for the hostile US government and distributing money to groups active in anti-security fields.”
BELGIUM’S REACTION
The Belgian Foreign Ministry stated that it will summon Iran’s ambassador to protest Vandecasteele’s sentence, noting that Tehran has provided “no information” regarding his trial.
“Belgium continues to condemn this arbitrary detention and is doing everything possible to put an end to it,” it said.
IRAN-WEST TENSIONS
The sentence comes amid escalating tensions between Iran and the West. Recently, the UK indicated that it would designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organisation, and the EU said it is considering a similar course of action. The US and Canada have already declared the IRGC as a terrorist organisation.
Moreover, Western countries have imposed sanctions on Iran for its crackdown on anti-regime protesters, supplying Russia with drones and missiles, and accelerating its nuclear programme.