Taoiseach Micheál Martin has said that every effort will be made to get Robert Pether home to his family in Roscommon as quickly as possible, following his release from custody in Iraq after four years in prison.
Mr Pether, who is an Australian citizen, has been in prison in Iraq since April 2021, after he was arrested on fraud charges following a contractual dispute involving his employer that arose out of the building of a new Central Bank building in Baghdad in Iraq.
The United Nations says it has been an arbitrary detention.
Speaking during a school visit in Passage West, Co Cork on Friday morning, Mr Martin welcomed Mr Pether’s release. He said that the imprisonment of the resident of Elphin, Co Roscommon, has been “very distressing” for his wife, children and other family members.
“I don’t want to say things that may in any way hinder his eventual arrival back to Ireland, but I believe this is a good first step.
“We have to work very hard with countries such as Iraq and others in terms [of] the treatment of Irish citizens. He is an Australian citizen, which is a complicating factor in all of this, but both ourselves and the Australian Government have been working together in terms of endeavouring to get him out.”
Mr Martin said that he remains concerned about the health of the 49-year-old.
“I certainly do (share the concern of his wife) and the knock-on impact, the significant impact, on the well-being of the family. I have met with (his wife) Desree, and I think it’s very upsetting. It is very difficult, as she said herself this morning, to see him now in terms of what the impact of prison has had on his life.”
Meanwhile, Desree Pether told Morning Ireland on RTÉ Radio 1 this morning that she was shocked at the poor physical condition of her husband when she spoke to him by video link.
She said that Mr Pether is “not well at all” and “really needs to just come home so he can get the proper medical attention he needs.”
She said that he has fainted a few times over the last few months.
“He is not eating properly because he can’t keep anything down. It is a shock to the system to see how far he has declined.”
Ms Pether and other family members have been actively campaigning to get Robert Pether out of prison since 2021. Mr Martin met with Mr Pether’s family in January of last year in his capacity as Minister for Foreign Affairs.
He also raised the case with Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York in September 2023.
The Department of Foreign Affairs raised the issue with Iraqi embassy in Dublin on numerous occasions whilst the detention of Mr Pether was also raised in Baghdad by Ireland’s Ambassador to Iraq, Marianne Bolger.
