It is good to see that Roxana Saberi is going to be released from an Iranian prison, but I have to wonder when the State Department’s quiet diplomacy is going to get hostages Euna Lee and Laura Ling released from North Korea?:

U.S.-born journalist Roxana Saberi is to be freed soon after an Iranian appeals court cut her eight-year jail sentence for spying to a suspended two-year term.

A judiciary source said Saberi, whose jailing on April 18 on charges of spying for the United States became a new source of tension between Tehran and Washington, had already been released and would be allowed to leave Iran.

But her father Reza said she had not yet walked free after more than three months in detention, saying he was waiting in front of Evin prison in northern Tehran.

“She will be freed today, hopefully. The papers are ready … it is just a matter of time, a couple of hours,” he told Reuters by telephone. “We are very happy.”

Reza Saberi said he and his Japanese wife Akiko would “bring our daughter back home,” apparently referring to the United States, where he moved in the early 1970s. “We will go back as soon as possible,” he said.

The development came a day after an appeals court held a hearing on the case of Saberi, a 32-year-old journalist who has worked for the BBC and U.S. National Public Radio.

“The appeals court … has reduced her jail sentence from eight years to two years of suspended sentence … and she will soon be free,” her defense lawyer Abdolsamad Khorramshahi said.  [Reuters]

I hadn’t realized that Saberi was half Japanese, but anyway it is still good to see her released; now lets see if the State Department can get the North Korean hostages released as well.