Anchor: A deal between the U.S. and Iran will reportedly grant Tehran access to once-frozen funds stuck in South Korea. This comes as the two countries negotiate the release of prisoners by both sides.
Tom McCarthy has this report.

Report: The U.S. and Iran reportedly reached a deal on the release of frozen Iranian assets in South Korea while also agreeing to a prisoner swap.

A statement by Tehran’s foreign ministry on Thursday said that the U.S. has guaranteed that it will release the funds that it says were illegally frozen under sanctions by Washington for years.

The ministry added on social media that the procedure to turn over the roughly seven billion U.S. dollars kept with the Bank of Korea and Woori Bank has already begun.

The funds, limited to use for humanitarian purposes, will reportedly be routed to Qatar through Switzerland.

The sudden end to the 2018 restriction on the assets, which were payments by South Korea for oil imports from Iran, coincides with a deal to release five U.S. citizens detained in the Middle Eastern country while sending five Iranians the other way.

The White House released a statement saying that the prisoners, who it says were unjustly imprisoned on espionage charges, have been transferred from the notorious Evin Prison to house arrest in the first phase of the exchange, but further details cannot be disclosed at this time.

Following the announcement of the agreement, an official from South Korea’s foreign ministry said it hopes the deal proceeds smoothly, adding that Seoul consulted closely with both Washington and Tehran on the plan.
Tom McCarthy, KBS World Radio News.