Sarkozy calls French academic on trial in Iran

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Young French academic Clotilde Reiss flew home from Iran on Sunday, 10 months after she was arrested and accused of spying, as France denied striking a secret deal with Tehran.A government jet brought the 24-year-old researcher to an airbase outside Paris after her lawyer paid Iran a fine of more than a quarter of a million dollars, and she was whisked to the office of President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Clotilde Reiss, the French academic arrested and held in Iran since last July has been released and is on the way home, the French president's office announced Sunday."The President of the Republic will receive her and her family at the Elysee Palace as soon as she arrives in Paris," at around 1:00 pm (1100 GMT), said the statement."Clotilde Reiss has boarded a French government plane at Dubai airport and is currently en route towards France," the statement added.

French academic Clotilde Reiss on Tuesday appeared before Tehran's Revolutionary Court and was then allowed to return to her country's embassy, the French foreign ministry said.The 24-year-old Iran expert was arrested at Tehran airport on July 1 and charged with "collecting information and provoking rioters" during mass protests over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election."She appeared before the judge and then came out and returned to the embassy," said foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero in Paris.

A French researcher who stood trial in Iran on charges linked to post-election unrest is still awaiting a verdict nearly three months after being freed on bail, the Fars news agency reported on Saturday quoting her lawyer.Clotilde Reiss was freed on bail on August 16 on condition that she stay at the French embassy in Tehran awaiting the verdict.Her lawyer Mohammad Ali Mahdavi Sabet said the revolutionary court reviewing the case has yet to issue a verdict and that Reiss cannot leave Iran before that, Fars reported.

Hundreds of people shouted slogans on Monday outside the French embassy in protest against the holding of a rally in France by Iran's main exiled opposition group."Shame on (President Nicolas) Sarkozy! Death to France! Shame on you, France, let go of the hypocrites!" chanted the crowd as police set up barricades outside the embassy in central Tehran, an AFP photographer said.Iranians call exiled opposition group the People's Mujahedeen of Iran (PMOI) "hypocrites," and Monday's demonstration was organised to protest against a PMOI rally outside Paris on Saturday.