Tehran: Iran hanged former Deputy Defense Minister Ali Reza Akbari, an Iranian as well as a British citizen, on charges of espionage.
According to foreign media reports, Ali Reza Akbari has been hanged for the murder of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsin Fakhrizadeh. Iranian authorities have also said that Ali Reza Akbari gave important national security secrets to Britain.
Al Jazeera According to Iran’s state-run news agency, a video has been released suggesting that Ali Reza Akbari played a role in the 2020 assassination of the country’s top nuclear scientist. According to the video, Akbari was involved in the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, who was killed in 2020 in a satellite-controlled machine gun attack outside Tehran.
Fakhrizadeh was named by Western intelligence agencies as the mastermind behind Iran’s covert efforts to develop large-scale nuclear weapons.
The BBC According to Meezan, the official Iranian judiciary news agency, reported on Saturday that 61-year-old Akbari had been hanged, but did not say when the execution took place.
The former Iranian deputy defense minister was arrested in 2019 and convicted of spying for Britain, which he denies.
The United States, Great Britain, and France have strongly condemned the execution of Ali Raza Akbari.
The news of the execution of Alireza Akbari by Iran’s Meezan judiciary came after BBC Persian aired an audio message from Akbari on Wednesday, in which he said he had been tortured and that cameras He was forced to confess to crimes he had not committed.
After the audio message was broadcast, Iran released a video of Akbari earlier this week, in which he appeared to confess to the crimes, while the country’s intelligence ministry named Akbari as a key British intelligence operative in Iran. Appointed as the best agent.
In the audio message, Akbari alleged that he was interrogated and tortured by intelligence agents for more than 3,500 hours. Forced to confess. He also accused Iran of wanting to “take revenge on Britain by hanging me.”
Hours after the audio message was broadcast, Meezan News Agency first confirmed that Akbari had been found guilty of espionage, and that the Supreme Court had rejected his appeal.