Tehran hands death sentence to ‘Mossad spy’

TEHRAN - Reuters

Iran has sentenced to death a person found guilty of providing information to Israel to help it assassinate several senior nuclear scientists, Tehran’s prosecutor said on Oct. 24.

Dolatabadi did not identify the defendant, but Amnesty International said on Oct. 23 that Ahmadreza Djalali, an Iranian doctor who studied and taught in Sweden, had been sentenced to death in Iran on espionage charges.

At least four scientists were killed between 2010 and 2012 in what Tehran said was a program of assassinations aimed at sabotaging its nuclear energy program. Iran hanged one man in 2012 over the killings.

On the latest conviction, Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi told the judiciary’s news agency: “The person had several meetings with Mossad and provided them with sensitive information about Iran’s military and nuclear sites in return for money and residency in Sweden.”

Amnesty said the court verdict against Djalali stated that he had worked with the Israeli government which then helped him obtain a Swedish residency permit.

Dolatabadi said the convicted person gave Mossad information about 30 scientists including Massoud Ali Mohammadi, who was killed by a remote-controlled bomb attached to a motorcycle outside his home in Tehran.

The judiciary said the defendant was also linked to the assassination of nuclear engineer Majid Shahriari, killed in a bomb attack in November 2010.