IRAN TO FREE HUNDREDS OF AFGHAN PRISONERS

hundreds of Afghan citizens languishing in Iranian jails would be released in the near future, the Ministry of Refugee and Returnee Affairs said. Iran would free around 400 jailed Afghan refugees as a result of fruitful talks in Tehran with representatives of the ministry and the International Committee of the Red Cross in that country. The accord also provides for health insurance cards to approximately a million legal Afghan refugees in Iran. Despite repeated efforts by the Afghan government, Iran refused to provide information regarding Afghans on death row, Minister of Justice Habibullah Ghalib said. He put at more than 5,000 the number of Afghan refugees imprisoned in Iran. Foreign Minister Dr. Zalmay Rasoul, on his return from a visit to Tehran in May 2010, said that 90 of the condemned prisoners had been executed.