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Update: Brussels Court of First Instance Bans Extradition of Iran’s Convicted Diplomat Terrorist to Iran, Schedules Substantive Case Hearing for Sep. 19

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The Brussels Court of First Instance convened on Thursday considering a request by the Iranian Resistance preventing the extradition and release of Assadollah Assadi, an Iranian regime diplomat-terrorist convicted and imprisoned for his direct role in a foiled 2018 bomb plot targeting a massive Iranian opposition rally near Paris.

The lawyers of Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the Iranian opposition coalition National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and international plaintiffs, as well as lawyers representing the Belgian Prime Minister, the Ministers of Justice and Foreign Affairs, were present at the hearing.

The court gave the parties until September 15 to exchange their briefs and set the date for the oral hearing by the parties for September 19. By doing so, the court extends the ban on returning Assadi to Iran until September 19 to undertake a substantive consideration of the plaintiffs’ request.

At midnight on July 20, immediately after the Belgian Parliament’s adoption of a treaty calling for a prisoners exchange between Belgium and the Iranian regime, Mrs. Rajavi, former Algerian Prime Minister Sid Ahmed Ghazali, former Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi, former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, Senator Robert Torricelli, former White House director for public liaison Linda Chavez, former UNAMI human rights office chief Tahar Boumedra, NCRI Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Mohammad Mohaddessin, NCRI Judiciary Committee Chairman Dr. Sanabargh Zahedi, Javad Dabiran, Deputy NCRI Representative in Germany, and Farzin Hashemi, NCRI Representative in international courts, submitted an urgent request to prevent Assadi’s repatriation to Iran. Subsequently, the Court of Appeal ruled for a substantive consideration of the case.