British national jailed in Iran over claims she gave ‘a lot of intelligence’ to Israel

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A British-Iranian citizen has been sentenced to 12 years in prison in the Islamic Republic of Iran after being accused of relaying “a lot of intelligence” to Israel’s Mossad spy agency.

Anusheh Ashuri, who holds dual citizenship in the U.K. and Iran, heard the sentence this week following her arrest two years ago, The Independent reported.

"Anusheh Ashuri had been connected to the Mossad and had relayed a lot of intelligence to that country," Gholamhossein Esmaeili, an Iranian judiciary spokesperson, was quoted by the Tasnim news agency as saying Tuesday. "She has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for spying and two years for illicitly acquiring money."

Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office told The Independent that it has been supporting Ashuri’s family since her arrest.

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Iran's President Hassan Rouhani, second left, speaks during a ceremony to unveil the Iran-made Bavar-373, a long-range surface-to-air missile system at an undisclosed location in Iran, Thursday, Aug. 22, 2019.  (Iranian Presidency Office via AP)

Iran this week also upheld the conviction of Aras Amiri, an Iranian who worked for the British Council cultural organization and was sentenced to 10 years in prison over allegations she was spying for the U.K.

Amiri was detained in Iran in March 2018 and was trying to appeal her sentence, according to the BBC.

Last week, her fiancé, James Tyson, wrote an op-ed for The Guardian saying that “she’s caught in the middle of two global powers who refuse, or don’t know how, to talk to each other.”

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“Aras is an Iranian citizen, and by fabricating untruths (lies that the Iranian ministry of intelligence knows to be utterly false), and imprisoning her through a bogus trial and an appeal without legal representation, the Iranian government is simply imprisoning its own citizen, shooting itself in the foot to spite an enemy,” he added.

Reports also emerged Tuesday that Iranian citizen Ali Johari was handed a 10-year sentence following claims that he spied for Israel.