In a Washington Examiner op-ed published on April 23, I told the story of Omid Kokabee, a young Iranian physicist who was arrested in Tehran on his way to the University of Texas in Austin in 2011, and subsequently sentenced to 10 years in prison on the charge of “communicating with a hostile government (meaning the United States)” and receiving illegitimate funds. In a letter from prison, Kokabee wrote that the actual reason for his arrest was his refusal to work on Iran’s secret military program on laser enrichment of uranium.

On May 10, two weeks after publication of the Examiner op-ed, Ali Akbar Salehi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, who was a key participant in the nuclear negotiations in Lausanne and Vienna, had a meeting with the lawyer and sister of Omid Kokabee. Mr. Salehi offered his help. He suggested that Kokabee’s lawyer prepare a letter asking for pardon, addressed to the intelligence services of Iran. Such a letter was promptly delivered to Salehi’s office.