Iran says 2,000 detained over alleged espionage links
Iran detained about 2,000 people accused of links to enemy intelligence networks during and after the 12-day war with Israel in June, a senior armed forces official said on Tuesday.
Iran detained about 2,000 people accused of links to enemy intelligence networks during and after the 12-day war with Israel in June, a senior armed forces official said on Tuesday.
Abolfazl Shekarchi, the armed forces’ cultural deputy, said a “wide spy network” had taken shape over several years with significant investment in training and organization.
“A large network of spies and enemy agents had been formed, and years of effort and heavy costs were spent to build it,” Shekarchi was quoted as saying by Iranian state media.
Shekarchi said the arrests started months before the fighting and continued through the end of the war.
“From a few months before the start of this war, because of the readiness in place, until the end of the war, around 2,000 of these agents were arrested,” he said.
He said rebuilding such networks would take time. “Reconstructing a network like this is not simple and requires years of time and cost,” Shekarchi said.
'Severe punishment'
Iran’s judiciary chief also cited roughly the same number of arrests in comments made in July, and said some detainees could face execution if convicted of working with Israel.
“In our law, anyone who cooperates with a hostile state during wartime must be arrested and prosecuted,” judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei said in an interview with state TV.
“Some of these individuals face severe punishments, including the death penalty,” he said, adding that others could receive lighter sentences or be released after investigation.
US cites executions, student case draws rights focus
The US State Department said on Tuesday that Iranian authorities executed more than 17 prisoners within 48 hours, including Aghil Keshavarz, a 27-year-old architecture student convicted of spying for Israel.
“Only in 48 hours, the Islamic Republic regime executed more than 17 prisoners,” the US State Department said in a post on its Persian-language account.
Iran’s judiciary said Keshavarz was executed after the Supreme Court upheld his death sentence and legal procedures were completed.
The execution prompted condemnation on social media and renewed focus by rights groups on Iran’s use of the death penalty in national security cases linked to alleged cooperation with Israel.
The Human Rights Activists News Agency said on Monday that at least 17 people have been executed in Iran over the past two days in prisons across Iran.
