An Iranian court has handed down a verdict in the espionage trial of jailed Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, the semiofficial news agency ISNA reported on Sunday, quoting the judiciary spokesman.
The verdict and the sentence are not yet known.
Rezaian, The Washington Post’s bureau chief in Tehran, was detained in Iran in July 2014, and has languished in jail for over a year despite an international outcry.
The Post and the Rezaian family had no immediate comment on the report of a ruling.
ISNA quoted the judiciary spokesman, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ejei, as saying that “this person has been sentenced, but I don’t know the details of the verdict.”
Mohseni Ejei said the ruling may be appealed by Rezaian or his lawyer in the next 20 days.
Rezaian’s trial began in May under a cloak of secrecy. Washington Post executive editor Marty Baron has called the trial a “sham” and the treatment of Rezaian a “travesty.”
The case has also become a symbol of the increased dangers faced by journalists around the world. Rezaian, who has dual Iranian and American citizenship, has been detained in Iran longer than any American journalist in the past.
Rezaian was not told for months of the charges against him. Prosecutors eventually accused him of espionage and other offenses, including “collaborating with a hostile government” and “propaganda against the establishment,” according to the Post.
The newspaper has steadfastly rejected the allegations, calling them “the product of fertile and twisted imaginations.”
The U.S. State Department called the charges “absurd.”
U.S. President Barack Obama faced criticism from some for concluding a deal between major world powers and Iran over Iran’s nuclear program without any pledge from Iran that it would release Rezaian and other Americans held in Iran.
In a speech this summer, Obama mentioned Rezaian and other Americans “who are unjustly detained in Iran.”
“Journalist Jason Rezaian should be released,” the President said.
Boxing great Muhammad Ali, an American Muslim, also urged Tehran to free Rezaian on bail.
“To my knowledge, Jason is a man of peace and great faith, a man whose dedication and respect for the Iranian people is evident in his work,” Ali said in a religiously worded statement issued in March.
Iran’s human rights chief, Mohammad Javad Larijani, told news outlet France 24 last year that he hoped Rezaian’s case would come to a positive conclusion. “Let us hope that this fiasco will end on good terms,” he said.
The Post has sought to keep world attention focused on the case. On Friday, it noted that Rezaian had been detained for 444 days — “the same amount of time as U.S. government employees during the Iran hostage crisis of 1979-1981.” The Post called this “a milestone significant in its injustice.”
