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Iran Detained 2nd French Researcher, Colleagues Say

Associated Press

   PARIS - The Iranian government has been holding a second French
   researcher in custody for the past four months, according to his
   colleagues.

   Roland Marchal, a sub-Saharan Africa specialist at Paris university
   Sciences Po, was arrested in June when he traveled to Iran to visit his
   partner, Fariba Adelkhah, according to Sciences Po professor Richard
   Banegas.
   Iranian authorities disclosed in July that they had arrested Adelkhah,
   a prominent anthropologist who holds dual French-Iranian nationality,
   on charges that have not been made public.
   There was no immediate acknowledgement of Marchal's arrest in Iranian
   state media.
   It's unclear exactly what charges Marchal faces, but Banegas told The
   Associated Press that he and his colleagues consider him ``an academic
   prisoner.''
   The French Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to requests for
   comment.

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