Iranian authorities have imposed a 28-year sentence on jailed Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele, a spokesman for his family said. His fate is linked to that of an Iranian diplomat accused of masterminding a 2018 foiled bomb plot in Paris.
The 43-year-old aid worker was arrested in Iran at the end of February on suspicion of spying. Both Belgium and Vandecasteele's family insist he is innocent.
Vandecasteele had lived in Iran since 2015, working as country director for the Norwegian Refugee Council and then for Relief International, before returning to Belgium last year.
He was quoted on several occasions by Iran's official press in his capacity as a relief worker.
His case became closely linked to that of Iranian diplomat Assadollah Assadi, who was accused of masterminding a plot to bomb a gathering of an opposition group of Iranian exiles in Paris in 2018.
The group, the National Council Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and which also goes by the name of "People's Mujaheddin" or "MEK", has bases in Auvers-sur-Oise near Paris, and in Albania.
In July 2018, the NCRI, led by Maryam Rajavi, held its annual gathering in Villepinte conference centre north of Paris.
In addition to Rajavi, the 25,000 attendees included several international heavyweights such as then President Donald Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, Newt Gingrich, the former conservative speaker of the US House of Representatives, and Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, a French-Colombian citizen.
During the meeting, police arrested a Belgian-Iranian couple carrying explosives, which investigators say were intended to be used to attack the NCRI gathering.
Assadi, a Vienna-based Iranian diplomat, was found guilty of masterminding the plot and sentenced to 20 years by a Belgian court in February 2021.
Months later, Vandecasteele returned to Iran where he was detained by its security services.
He became part of a group of foreign citizens held in Tehran's jails – accused of vague crimes and who have not been fairly tried.
Prisoner exchange?
In July this year, the Belgian parliament voted 79 to 41 to support a treaty that would allow prisoner exchanges with Iran.
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croo's government argued that this was the only route possible to free Vandecasteele.
But the Belgian opposition immediately charged that the agreement with Tehran was "tailor made" to permit Assadi's release, and NCRI exiles mounted street protests and a ferocious lobbying campaign.
On 3 October, the NCRI, together with its leader Maryam Rajavi and nine other signatories, including Betancourt, asked the Belgian Constitutional Court to nullify the prisoner exchange treaty.
Vandecasteele and his lawyers, along with the Belgian government, strongly argued against the suspension.
The court document, published on 8 December, which presented the arguments of both sides, states that Vandecasteele had been "arbitrarily detained since 24 February 2022 in Iranian jails under bad circomstances". It also noted an "improvement" in his situation after the treaty between Belgium and Iran was initially approved, just weeks after his imprisonment.
He is now reportedly afraid that if the treaty is suspended, his situation "may deteriorate".
On 8 December, the Belgian constitutional court, under pressure from the NCRI, decided that the treaty would be nullified.
The NCRI argued that if it came into force it was "very likely" that Assadi would then be transferred to Iran and "he would never serve his full prison sentence".
Moreover, NCRI's lawyers argued that its members' lives would be in serious danger because Assadi "would be able to continue his terrorist activities, aimed at eliminating all opponents of the Iranian regime".
On 14 December, Iran sentenced Vandecasteele to 28 years in prison.
According to the French press agency AFP, Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne, a friend of the family, said that he "had received a call from his Iranian counterpart communicating the court's verdict, but that they had no details on the charges".
The news on Vandecasteele's sentence has revived debate in Belgium about whether the prisoner exchange treaty with Iran should be implemented after all.
"It is clear that Olivier has become the victim of an international campaign against this treaty," Vandercasteele's lawyer Olivia Venet told Belgian daily Het Laatste Nieuws.
"This is an innocent man whose right to life and other human rights are not being respected."
The court will make its final decision on the case in three months time.
