In July, Qatar released eight Iranian sailors out of a group of several others who were imprisoned for entering the Gulf state’s territorial waters.

Qatar has released 10 Iranian prisoners who had been incarcerated for over 20 years, as part of efforts by Tehran’s Ministry of Justice to repatriate Iranians held in foreign prisons.

“With the help of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we corresponded with Qatar to release 10 Iranian prisoners who had been serving over 20 years of detention in Qatari prisons, and this was done,” Askar Jalalian, Iran’s Deputy Minister of Justice for Human Rights and International Affairs, told the Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA) on Monday.

Jalalian noted that five of the prisoners had returned to Iran “in previous days” whereas the remaining five arrived on Saturday. The names of the prisoners and the reason behind their imprisonment have not been disclosed.

“We are committed to ensuring that Iranian citizens held in foreign prisons are brought back home whenever possible,” Jalalian said.

He added that Iran had reached agreements with Iraq for the transfer of 130 prisoners from the country. Another deal had been reached with Malaysia over the transfer of 85 prisoners from the country, with both transfers expected to take place “soon”, ISNA reported.

Meanwhile, in July, Qatar released eight Iranian sailors out of a group of several others who were imprisoned for entering the Gulf state’s territorial waters.

In a statement at the time, Jalalian said that the sailors were mainly from the southern provinces of Bushehr, Hormozgan and Khuzestan.

The Iranian official said the sailors from the southern provinces would enter the territorial waters of neighbouring countries “due to lack of information or because their vessels are caught in storms”.