TEHRAN, Iran — An American scholar accused of promoting revolution in Iran has been allowed to leave the country and reunite with her family in Austria, ending months of protests by human-rights groups and heated exchanges between Tehran and Washington.

Haleh Esfandiari, 67, who was released on bail August 21 after four months in prison, was contacted by Iranian authorities Sunday and told to pick up her passport, her lawyer told reporters yesterday. She flew out of Tehran and arrived in Austria, where her sister lives, to rejoin her husband, Shaul Bakhash, a historian at George Mason University in Virginia.

“After a long and difficult ordeal, I am elated to be on my way back to my home and my family,” Ms. Esfandiari said in a statement released by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, where she heads the Middle East program. “These last eight months that included 105 days in solitary confinement in Evin prison have not been easy. But I wish to put this episode behind me and to look to the future, not to the past.”

There also were indications that an Iranian-American journalist working for an American-funded radio program and charged with similar crimes would be allowed to leave the country. Parnaz Azima, a correspondent for Radio Farda, has been free on bail.

“I was summoned to the Intelligence Ministry and they told me, ‘Go and collect your passport,'” Ms. Azima told the Los Angeles Times yesterday. “But today, it was too late, and I couldn’t make it because of office hours. Tomorrow, I will pick up my passport and leave the country as soon as possible.”

It was unclear what Iran’s motivations were in releasing Ms. Esfandiari, who holds dual American and Iranian citizenship. The decision came during intense lobbying by current and former American officials and at a time when the Bush administration is calling for another round of U.N. sanctions to curtail Iran’s nuclear program.