Azerbaijan pardons French prisoner after EU caves in on sanctions

INTELLIGENCE SUMMARY

Editor's note: this is a developing story Azerbaijan's leader Ilham Aliyev pardoned a French national on Sept. 23 reports France 24, hours after the EU agreed to delist two Russian oligarchs from sanctions. The EU was forced by French pressure to drop sanctions against oligarchs Alisher Usmanov and Mikhail Fridman on Sept. 22, in return for allowing the bloc's remaining 3,000 Russia sanctions to remain in force. The French government has not publicly cited why it adopted this position, and on