Swedish-Iranian national to be executed by May 21 for spying

DUBAI - Swedish-Iranian national Ahmad Reza Jalali is to be executed May 21 at the latest, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency said on Wednesday, citing sources.

Jalali, a disaster medicine doctor and researcher, was arrested in 2016 on an academic visit to Iran and sentenced to death on charges of espionage for Israel's Mossad.

The report comes as Hamid Noury, a former Iranian prosecution official arrested by Swedish authorities in 2019, faces a life sentence in Sweden on charges of international war crimes and human rights abuses.

Noury is accused of playing a leading role in the killing of political prisoners executed on government orders at the Gohardasht prison in Karaj, Iran, in 1988.

The Swedish foreign ministry did not immediately comment on the ISNA report.

Under Swedish law, courts can try Swedish citizens and other nationals for crimes against international law committed abroad.

Iran's foreign ministry summoned the Swedish ambassador on Monday to convey the Islamic Republic's objection "to the baseless and fabricated accusations that the Swedish prosecutor made against Iran during Noury's court case", ISNA reported in an earlier article.