On the Hunt for Spies, Iran Executes a Nuclear Scientist

Middle East|On the Hunt for Spies, Iran Executes a Nuclear Scientist

Iran executed one of its nuclear scientists on Wednesday over allegations that he was a spy for Israel and had facilitated Israel’s assassination of another nuclear scientist during the two countries’ war in June, according to the judiciary’s news outlet, Mizan.

The judiciary said the scientist, Roozbeh Vadi, had worked at one of the country’s most sensitive and important nuclear sites and had access to the type of classified information sought by Iran’s enemies. Mr. Vadi was executed by hanging after he was found guilty of espionage and providing information to Israel, the judiciary said.

The execution follows a 12-day war with Israel and the United States in June, when Israel assassinated at least 30 Iranian senior military commanders and 11 nuclear scientists.

Iranian officials have acknowledged publicly that Israel’s widespread infiltration of its security and intelligence apparatuses enabled Israel to eliminate key parts of Iran’s military chain of command in the war’s first night and helped it launch drone attacks from inside Iran. Following the war, officials have blamed Israel for a series of explosions and fires around the country.

While the two countries have been locked in a long-running shadow war, the apparent accuracy of Israel’s information and its launching attacks inside the country have rattled Iranian officials.

Since the war ended, authorities have swept up hundreds of people, including activists and dissidents, on suspicions of spying and threatening national security, Iranian media reports and rights groups say.

But the arrest and execution of a nuclear scientist is extremely rare in a nation that takes great pride in its domestic nuclear program, with scientists hailed as national heroes. It is also an embarrassing admission of the possible extent to which the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence service, has infiltrated Iran.

Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence said last week in a statement that it had arrested 20 spies and operatives linked to Israel. Iran has executed 10 people, including Mr. Vadi, on charges of spying for Israel since the war started in June, rights groups say.

The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel — which oversees Mossad — did not respond to a request for comment on Mr. Vadi’s execution and allegations he was affiliated with Israel. There was no immediate comment from Mr. Vadi’s family or a legal representative. Until the judiciary’s announcement of his execution, Iran had not disclosed his arrest.

Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei, Iran’s chief of judiciary, said on Tuesday that the country would deal forcefully with spies and that it would speed up trials for people arrested recently, according to official Iranian media reports.

“The spies must be identified but recognizing spies is not easy, we can’t find them off the streets, our intelligence system must identify and arrest them,” said Mr. Mohseni-Ejei. “But we need to do it with due and fair judicial process.”

Human rights groups have accused Iran of violating Iranians’ rights and conducting arbitrary executions, and have expressed concern that the widespread crackdown since the war in June could be used to repress dissent. The judicial process in Iran for people accused of espionage is often opaque, with trials carried out by the Revolutionary Court behind closed doors.

There have been at least two previous high-profile arrests and executions related to spying for the United States and Britain.

In 2016, Iran executed Shahram Amiri, a nuclear scientist, for treason after he defected to the United States and then returned to Iran claiming he had been abducted by U.S. intelligence services while on a religious pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia.

And in 2023, Iran executed Alireza Akbari, a former deputy defense minister, who had been spying for the British intelligence service for 15 years and had revealed sensitive nuclear secrets to the West, including the location of the underground nuclear site Fordo, which was bombed by the United States in June.

Iran’s judiciary laid out its allegations against Mr. Vadi on its news outlet, which serves as a public communication platform. It said that the Mossad had recruited Mr. Vadi online and that he had met with his handlers in Austria on five occasions and sent them weekly reports on activities at the nuclear site where he worked. Israel paid him crypto currency, the report said, without revealing the amount.

Iran’s state television broadcast on Wednesday a confession video from Mr. Vadi admitting to the allegations against him. Rights groups have accused Iran of forcing detainees to record confession videos under duress.

The alumni network of Amir Kabir University, a prominent science and engineering school, said in a statement that Mr. Vadi had graduated from the university with a doctoral degree in nuclear engineering with a focus on reactors and he was working as a researcher at the elite Research Institute for Nuclear Science at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran.

Iran also executed a second man on Wednesday, Mehdi Asgharzadeh, whom the judiciary identified as a member of the Islamic State terrorist group. Iran said he had been trained in Iraq and Syria and had entered Iran to carry out terrorist attacks.

Leily Nikounazar contributed reporting from Belgium.