Iran arrests British-Iranian as suspected spy

The individual, who wasn’t identified, was arrested last week in Tehran, Fars news agency reported Tuesday, citing Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi.

The arrest is said to have taken place in the last week with a senior prosecutor saying it came as part of a crackdown on “Western infiltration”. The British Foreign Office, Iranian officials in Tehran and Iran’s mission to the United Nations also did not immediately comment.

The British government has not commented on the report.

Since the nuclear deal with world powers a year ago, Iranian authorities have detained a number of dual nationals visiting the country, accusing them of a variety of security-related charges.

The government does not recognise dual nationality, which prevents relevant Western embassies seeing individuals who have been detained.

Stay on topic – This helps keep the thread focused on the discussion at hand. Earlier in July, Dolatabadi said indictments had been filed against British-Iranian Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, an employee of the Thomson Reuters Foundation; American-Iranian business consultant Siamak Namazi, and Canadian-Iranian anthropologist Homa Hoodfar, who are also held in Iran. Later, news organizations with close ties to security services offered details of the charges.

A British-Iranian businessman, Kamal Foroughi, was convicted in 2013 of spying and is serving an eight-year prison sentence.

It’s unclear why Iran is increasingly detaining dual nationals, but analysts and others have suggested hard-liners want concessions from the West in exchange for releasing them. AP material published by LongIsland.com, is done so with explicit permission. Please see our terms of service for more information.