Iran Jails ‘Nuclear Spy’ For Six Years

RFL/RE – Tehran’s prosecutor says an unnamed person has been sentenced to six years in prison after being convicted of relaying information about Iran’s nuclear program to a U.S. intelligence agent and a European country.

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Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told judiciary news website Mizan that the Iranian court also ordered the confiscation of the money the convict allegedly received for the information.

Dolatabadi said the alleged spy met the U.S. agent nine times and provided him with information about “nuclear affairs and sanctions.”

The convict also provided the information to a European country, the prosecutor added, without providing further details.

In December, Dolatabadi said Iran’s Supreme Court had upheld a death sentence against Ahmadreza Djalali, an Iranian-Swedish academic convicted of providing information to Israel about Iran’s nuclear and defense plans and personnel.

Djalali, a researcher at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute, has denied the charges.

Iran insists its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, while the United States and other countries claim it has been trying to develop nuclear weapons.

U.S. President Donald Trump said last month that he wanted to work with European allies and Congress to fix what he called “disastrous flaws” in the 2015 nuclear accord between Tehran and world powers.

Trump warned that Washington would withdraw from the deal, which curbed Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the easing of crippling international sanctions targeting Tehran, if the terms of the agreement are not strengthened within four months.

Tehran has ruled out any changes in the agreement, while the other signatories — Britain, France, Germany, China, and Russia — have closed ranks in support of the accord.

Also on February 4, Iran’s judiciary acknowledged that it had granted medical leave to an 81-year-old Iranian-American convicted of “collaborating with the hostile American government.”

However, the judiciary sought to downplay any expectation that Baquer Namazi would be put on an indefinite release after his recent surgery to install a pacemaker.

“Like many prisoners who can go on leave, he went on a three-day leave,” spokesman Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said. “When he was out of prison, they requested the leave to be extended for another three days.”

“His leave must have come to an end yesterday or today,” he added.

Namazi’s lawyer Jared Genser said he believed his client would remain on leave until at least February 5.

Baquer Namazi, a retired UNICEF official, and his son Siamak are serving 10-year prison sentences.

A United Nations human rights group and the United States have called for their immediate release.

With reporting by AP and Reuters