US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that his country had begun contacts with Iran regarding the Americans in its custody, and would not accept long-term solutions, while the Iranian State Department denied what it described as Sullivan's "allegations".

In an interview with CBS News, Sullivan said Sunday that his country's strong message to the Iranians is "We will not accept long-term solutions while Tehran continues to detain Americans unfairly and illegally."

He stressed that his country intends to continue calling for the safe return of those Americans to their homes, noting that "this humanitarian catastrophe has aroused complete and absolute anger among the Americans."

He stressed that the Biden administration considers the file of Americans detained in Iran a priority.

While Sullivan did not specify the number of detainees, US media said they were 3, and they are "Samak Nyamazi", a businessman with Iranian and American citizenship, who has been detained with his eighty-year-old father since 2016, and they were sentenced to 10 years imprisonment after being convicted of "spying" for the United States .

In a similar case, the Iranian-American, Murad Tahbaz, a member of an environmental group, is serving a 10-year prison sentence for "conspiring with the United States."

Iranian denial

For its part, the Iranian Foreign Ministry denied, on Sunday, what it described as Sullivan's "allegations" regarding negotiations between the two countries regarding American prisoners.

The local Tasnim news agency quoted ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh as saying that "Sullivan claimed in a television interview on Sunday that the US government had begun communicating with Iranian officials about the American hostages," explaining that the news "is not true, and there is no direct dialogue between Tehran and Washington." In any field".

"Our priority is the release of Iranian prisoners in the United States," Khatibzadeh said.

An Iranian news site said on Sunday that any contact between Tehran and Washington about Americans detained in Iran was through the Swiss embassy that manages American interests and not through any direct contact.

The website affiliated with the Supreme National Security Council of Iran quoted an unnamed source as saying that "the Iranian government did not discuss the issue of American detainees with Washington. All messages were exchanged through the Swiss embassy in Tehran."