Iran set to execute Swedish-Iranian national this month over Israeli spying charges

A Swedish-Iranian national sentenced to death in Iran on charges of spying for Israeli intelligence is to be executed this month, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency said on Wednesday, citing sources.

Ahmadreza Djalali, a disaster medicine doctor and researcher, was arrested in 2016 on an academic visit to Iran and is to be executed by May 21, ISNA said.

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. 

Amnesty International has said previously that Djalali's sentence should be overturned. 

“It is appalling that despite repeated calls from UN human rights experts to quash Ahmadreza Djalali’s death sentence and release him, the Iranian authorities have instead decided to push for this irreversible injustice.

"They must immediately halt any plans to execute Ahmadreza Djalali and end their shocking assault on his right to life," Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa Diana Eltahawy said.