Iran nuclear scientist in United States spy mystery reportedly executed

Amiri was allowed to return to Iran in 2010, where he was initially celebrated as a national hero.

In July previous year, Iran agreed to rein in its nuclear program following a landmark agreement – called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action – with the P5+1 group of world powers, including the United States, UK, France, China and Russian Federation plus Germany.

Shahram Amiri had earlier been sentenced to death by a lower court, judiciary spokesman Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejehi told the official Islamic Republic News Agency.

Ejeie said Amiri’s case had been “one of the biggest blows” to U.S. efforts to obtain information from inside Iran.

The report today quotes a spokesman for the Iranian judiciary as saying Amiri “provided the enemy with vital information of the country”.

But Amiri later fled the country without the money, and was welcomed home as a hero by Iranian officials, who touted his claim that USA agents had kidnapped him while he was visiting holy sites in Saudi Arabia.

Amiri’s disappearance will raise concerns about the future of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian aid worker being held by Tehran. He later returned to Iran, where he was detained, tried and convicted.

One of those emails, which a Clinton aide forwarded to the then-secretary of state in July 2010, referred to Amiri as “our friend”.

He denied he was a nuclear scientist and said United States officials wanted him to tell the media he had “defected on his own and was carrying important documents and a laptop which contained classified secrets of Iran’s military nuclear programme”. But Ejei did not shed light on why Amiri’s detention and trial were carried out in secret or on the extent of the alleged information he passed along. He later said he wanted to stay in the USA only to post another video in which he said he wanted to go back home. He also said Israeli agents were present at his interrogations and that that Central Intelligence Agency officers offered him $50 million to remain in America.

“I have not done any activity against my homeland”, he said.

Amiri appeared to be mentioned in emails released past year by Clinton as part of investigations into her use of a private server while she was secretary of state.

Tehran and Washington have had no diplomatic ties since 1980, when students stormed the U.S. embassy following the previous year’s Islamic revolution. Our person won’t be able to do anything anyway.

“The gentleman you have talked to Bill Burns about has apparently gone to his country’s interests [sic] section because he is unhappy with how much time it has taken to facilitate his departure”, he wrote.