US journalist jailed in Iran will be freed soon

An Iranian appeals court has reduced the eight-year jail sentence for Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi to a suspended two-year term and she will soon be freed, her defence lawyer told Reuters today.

Lawyer Abdolsamad Khorramshahi was speaking a day after the court heard the case of Saberi, who was jailed by a lower court on April 18 on charges of spying for the United States.

"The appeals court ... has reduced her jail sentence from eight years to two years of suspended sentence ... and she will soon be free," Khorramshahi told Reuters.

He said Saberi will be banned from doing any reporting work in Iran for five years.

Saberi's father Reza said he and his wife Akiko were on their way to Tehran's Evin jail, where their daughter has been held since late January, "to bring our daughter back home."

Reza Saberi told Reuters his daughter would be allowed to leave Iran.