Iran allowed them to leave on Tuesday, in a surprising move as France seeks to distance itself from the conflict in the Middle East. They arrived in Paris on Wednesday morning. French President Emmanuel Macron welcomed on Wednesday the return of two of his citizens who had been detained in Iran for three and a half years, describing their arrival as «the end of a terrible ordeal». Macron wrote on the social media platform X after meeting them in the gardens of the Élysée Palace. Jacques Paris (72) and Cécile Kohler (41) had been under house arrest inside the French Embassy in Tehran since November 2022 after being held in Evin prison since 2022 on charges of spying, an accusation that France says is false.
