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Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera
National
Priyanka Shankar

US-Iran relations: Why did the prisoner exchange deal happen now?

Darian Dalili holds up a sign as he protests during a hunger strike outside the White House in Washington, DC as he calls for the release of his father, Shahab Dalili, a US permanent resident held in an Iranian prison since 2016 [File: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP]

Earlier this month, after more than two years of closed-door negotiations, the United States and Iran agreed to a prisoner swap deal, which once implemented, will see Tehran releasing five US-Iranian citizens in exchange for the release of several Iranians jailed in the US, and access to billions of dollars in frozen funds.

But questions about why the deal is only happening now, when some of the prisoners have been in jail for years, continue to linger.

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