Iran has executed a British-Iranian national who once served as its deputy defense minister, its judiciary said, calling for his release after being sentenced to death for spying for Britain. and defied calls from Washington.
Britain, which declared the case against Alireza Akbari to be politically motivated, condemned the execution, with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak calling it “a despicable and cowardly act by a barbaric regime”.
Akbari, 61, was arrested in 2019.
The Iranian judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported the execution without specifying when it took place. Late Friday, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said Iran should not comply with the sentence.
The execution is set to further worsen Iran’s long-strained relations with the West, which have deteriorated since talks to revive the 2015 nuclear deal deadlocked and Tehran carried out a deadly crackdown on protesters last year. .
Both France and the United States condemned the execution.
In an audio recording purportedly from Akbari and broadcast by BBC Farsi on Wednesday, he said he confessed to crimes he did not commit after extensive torture.
“Alireza Akbari, who had been sentenced to death on charges of corruption on earth and extensive operations against the country’s internal and external security through espionage for the Intelligence Service of the British Government … was executed Mizan said.
The Mizan report accused Akbari of receiving payments of 1,805,000 euros ($1.95 million), 265,000 pounds ($323,989.00) and $50,000 for espionage.
Sunak said on Twitter that he was “appalled by the execution”, adding that Tehran had “no respect for the human rights of its own people”. Cleverly said in a statement that it “will not stand unchallenged”, later announcing that Britain had imposed sanctions on Iran’s prosecutor general.
The US ambassador to London, Jane Hartley, called the execution “appalling and sickening”.
“The United States joins the UK in condemning this barbaric act,” she wrote on Twitter.
British statements on the matter have not addressed the Iranian allegation that Akbari had spied for Britain.
Iran’s foreign ministry summoned the British ambassador on Saturday over what it called London’s “interference in Iran’s national security territory”, state news agency IRNA reported.
Iranian state media, which portrays Akbari as a super spy, aired a video on Thursday in which he said he played a role in the 2020 assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, outside Tehran. was killed in an attack which the authorities blamed. Israel at that time.
In the video, Akbari did not confess to involvement in the assassination, but said that a British agent had asked for information about Fakhrizadeh.
Iran’s state media often broadcasts alleged statements by suspects in politically charged cases.
Reuters could not establish the authenticity of the state media video and audio, or when and where they were recorded.
Akbari was a close associate of Ali Shamkhani, now secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, who was defense minister from 1997 to 2005, when Akbari was his deputy as part of the administration of reformist President Mohammad Khatami.
He fought as a member of the Revolutionary Guards during the Iran–Iraq War in the 1980s.
This is a rare case of a serving or former senior official of the Islamic Republic being executed. One of the last occasions was in 1984, when Iranian Navy Commander Bahram Afzali was executed on charges of spying for the Soviet Union.
‘3,500 hours of torture’
French President Emmanuel Macron said the execution was a “disgusting and barbaric act”. “His name is too long on the list of victims of repression and capital punishment in Iran,” he wrote on Twitter.
Iran’s relations with the West have also been strained by its support for Russia in Ukraine, where Western states say Moscow used Iranian drones during the invasion.
Britain, which has a long history of fractious relations with Iran, and other Western states have strongly criticized Tehran over anti-government protests in September after a young Iranian-Kurdish woman died in custody.
Iran has issued dozens of death sentences as part of the crackdown, with at least four people being executed.
In an audio recording broadcast by BBC Persian, Akbari said that he had made a false confession as a result of torture.
With more than 3,500 hours of torture, psychedelic drugs, and methods of physical and psychological coercion, they took away my will. They drove me to the brink of insanity… and forced me to give a false statement by force of arms and threatening to kill me.
Amnesty International said the execution again demonstrated Tehran’s “vicious attack on the right to life”.
In Akbari’s case “it is particularly appalling that he was jailed for the violations he exposed,” it said in a tweet.
Iranian officials have not responded to allegations that Akbari was tortured.
An Iranian state TV report – the details of which Reuters could not independently verify – said he was arrested on charges of espionage in 2008, before being bailed and left Iran.
The report said that in 2009 he went to Austria on the pretext of medical treatment, then to Spain and finally to England.
In an interview with the BBC Persian broadcast on Friday, Akbari’s brother Mehdi said he had returned to Iran in 2019 at Shamkhani’s invitation.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)