Azerbaijan's president on Wednesday pardoned Martin Ryan, a Frenchman jailed since 2023 on espionage charges, following the European Union's removal of two Russian billionaires from its sanctions list.
President Ilham Aliyev pardoned 20 people in total, having taken into account their "personalities, state of health, family circumstances" and other reasons, his website said.
A senior diplomat in Brussels had told AFP that France had pushed for the EU to lift sanctions on a Russian oligarch, seeking the release of French prisoners.