Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday pardoned an Israeli-US woman jailed for drug trafficking, on the eve of a visit to Moscow by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Netanyahu, who has pushed hard for her release in his campaign for re-election on March 2, is to brief Putin on US President Donald Trump’s Middle East plan.
“I thank my friend President Putin for having pardoned Naama Issahar,” Netanyahu said in a statement before leaving Washington.
Photo: AFP
“I am looking forward to our meeting tomorrow [yesterday] in which we will discuss the plan [by Trump] and latest events in the region,” he added.
Naama Issachar, 26, was arrested at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport in April last year, as she traveled from India to Israel and was sentenced in October to seven-and-a-half years in prison.
Russian authorities said they found 9g of cannabis in her checked luggage.
“Guided by the principles of humanity, I pardon Naama Issachar,” Putin said in the decree cited by the Kremlin.
The young woman’s fate had sparked a wave of sympathy in Israel, where Netanyahu had pledged to do everything for her release.
The Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot reported that the young woman was to return to Israel yesterday in Netanyahu’s plane.
“I am moved of course. I’m thinking about Naama. I don’t know if she knows, if they told her,” Naama’s mother, Yaffa Issachar, said thanking Netanyahu, Israelis and others who worked for her release.
In December, Issachar lost an appeal against her sentence, which Netanyahu has described as disproportionate.
When traveling to Israel last week for commemorations for the liberation of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz in Poland 75 years ago, Putin appeared before the cameras with Naama Issachar’s mother and Netanyahu.
Putin said he had assured her mother that all would go well, while Yaffa Issachar said Putin had promised to send her daughter home.
Naama Issachar’s Russian lawyer, Vadim Kliouvgant, said “the procedure for her release was under way, in line with the decree.”
Imprisoned in the Moscow region, Naama Issachar had on Sunday signed a request for a pardon addressed to Putin. She had initially refused to do so.
During the December appeal hearing, she had proclaimed her innocence, denouncing the absurdity of accusations against her.
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