Confusion as Iranian reports say British Deputy Ambassador has been arrested for spying – but Foreign Office denies it
- The deputy head of the British Embassy in Iran reportedly faces a spying charge
- Giles Whitaker is said to be accused of taking soil samples from military zones
- Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency reported that foreigners had been arrested
- But UK Foreign Office denied the story of an arrested British diplomat as ‘false’
Iranian media reported today the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has accused the deputy ambassador of the United Kingdom and other foreigners of ‘espionage’ and taking soil samples from prohibited military zones.
It was not immediately clear if British deputy ambassador Giles Whitaker and other foreigners were detained.
The country’s state-run IRNA news agency reported that the foreigners had been arrested, but did not say when or whether they were currently in custody.
News outlets claimed that Mr Whitaker, the deputy head of mission at the British Embassy, and other foreigners faced ‘spying’ charges after visiting various forbidden areas in the country while the Guard was carrying out ballistic missile tests.
Iranian media also identified a Polish scientist at Kopernik University in Poland as one of the accused foreigners. It similarly said he took samples of soil, water and salt from a forbidden area.
Giles Whitaker, Deputy Head of Mission at the British Embassy in Tehran, was allegedly arrested by the country’s Revolutionary Guard – a claim denied by the Foreign Office
The IRGC news agency claimed foreign diplomats are typically deployed to locate military sites and report back on equipment, The Jerusalem Post reports.
IRGC also alleged embassy workers are providing material for a case regarding ‘military aspects of Iran’s file in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).’
These claims were rebuffed by the UK Foreign Office in a Sky News report, which said any story about a British diplomat arrested in Iran was ‘completely false’.
Tonight, the Secretary of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights Kazem Gharibabadi blasted the UK for leading what he claimed was an ‘anti-Iran project over human rights,’ the IRNA reports.
The British Embassy in Iran
Gharibabadi also alleged most UN special rapporteurs for Iran are paid for by the British government and live within the UK.
Iran has in the past arrested dual nationals and those with Western ties, often on espionage charges, and leveraged them as bargaining chips in talks over other issues, such as nuclear negotiations.
Talks to revive Tehran’s tattered nuclear deal with world powers have stalled for months. A recent effort to break the deadlock between U.S. and Iranian negotiators ended without a breakthrough in Doha last week.
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