Iran to execute ‘Mossad agent’ for killing Iranian scientists

The Islamic Republic branded a disaster medicine researcher as a “Mossad agent,” giving him just 20 days to appeal the death sentence an Iranian judge handed down.

While Iranian officials attempted to maintain secrecy with regard to a scientist who was recently doomed to be put to death, international organizations are releasing the man’s identity, naming him as Ahmadreza Djalali. While Djalali is affiliated with prestigious institutions in Italy, Belgium and Sweden, he was arrested in April 2016 in Tehran during an academic visit.

While visiting the Islamic Repbublic, Djalali was accused of “collaboration with a hostile government,” as prosecutors attempted to pin on him the deaths of several Iranian scientists associated with the nation’s nuclear weapons program. Among the Iranian government’s accusations were claims that Djalali received remuneration, academic positions and research initiatives as compensation for espionage activity on behalf of Israel.

In reality, Djalali “works on improving hospitals’ emergency responses to armed terrorism and radiological, chemical and biological threats,” according to Nature, one of the top peer-reviewed publications in the world.

Not long before the death sentence was revealed, “A close contact of Djalali’s (who would prefer to remain anonymous) circulated a document that claims to be a literal transcription of a handwritten text produced by Djalali inside Evin prison, where he is being held. The document states that Djalali believes he was arrested for refusing to spy for the Iranian intelligence service,” Nature reported.

The Djalali episode is only the latest chapter in Iran’s atrocious record of human rights violations and horrific atrocities committed against its own citizens and foreign nationals. In 1988, for instance, the Iranian regime hung literally tens of thousands of political prisoners and supporters of opposition movements, burying the victims in mass graves, based on a decree issued by Iranian regime founder Ayatollah Khomeini.

Iran is also widely believed to have been behind bombings in the 1990s targeting Jews in Argentina that claimed the lives of over 100 victims and injured hundreds of others. Politically motivated executions and the persecution of various minority groups are currently widespread practices in Iran.

By: Ebin Sandler, World Israel News

Espionagehuman rightsIranMossad