20 January 2023 , 03:35
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Relatives of British-Iranian dual national Alireza Akbari have not been able to see his body or lay him to rest following his execution.
Akbari was executed in Iran after being accused of spying for MI6, according to state TV.
A former deputy defence minister during the tenure of former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami, the 61-year-old was arrested sometime between 2019 and 2020 and accused of spying for the UK.
Iranian state TV confirmed the execution on Twitter, saying that Akbari had been executed after facing charges of "corruption and widespread action against the internal and external security of the country through espionage for the intelligence apparatus of the British government".
Akbari had continued to deny the charges.
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Akbari's family say they have been unable to see his body (Khabaronline News Agency/ZUMA Press Wire/REX/Shutterstock)His Tehran-based family had attempted to have him buried in the grave in which he had asked to be laid to rest in Shiraz, his birthplace, they told The Guardian.
The evidence against Akbari was extracted under torture and he had reportedly appealed his sentence.
Akbari’s sister and daughter went to the Tehran cemetery where officials had told them he would be buried in order to collect the body, but were told that a man with the same name and details had already been laid to rest and there was no body to collect.
The family, who only learned of Akbari's death via a judicial news agency announcement, were advised that they would need to sign a form agreeing to have him buried in Tehran and that any attempt to relocate his body to Shiraz would lead to it being destroyed, they claimed.
When they arrived to bury Akbari in the agreed plot, they were informed that he had already been buried there days earlier.
Foreign Secretary James Cleverley called the situation 'deeply distressing' (PA)The Guardian reported a member of the family not resident in Iran as saying: “We have never seen the body. We do not know if he is in that grave site.
“We do not know if he was executed on Thursday or Sunday, or even if the talk of parole was just to string us along. Perhaps even we do not know if he is dead or alive, because we cannot access the grave.
“They are just playing with us. It is cruel and heartless. They have tried to destroy his reputation by fabricating that he is a traitor, and now this.”
Foreign secretary James Cleverley said in a Commons statement that the news filled him with revulsion, describing it as “deeply distressing”.