Prison sentence for British embassy employee in Iran

Hossein Ressam, the 44-year-old employee of British Embassy who was arrested in the post-election events has been sentenced to four years in prison by Iranian judiciary. The Iranian national who worked at the embassy as a political analyst has been convicted of espionage and inciting unrest.
David Miliband, British minister of foreign affairs, claimed the sentence was “wholly unjustified” and “a harassment of embassy staff for going about their normal and legitimate duties.”

Summoning the Iranian ambassador in Britain, Mr. Miliband conveyed to him that this sentence was an attack on the whole diplomatic community in Iran.

The European Union has also condemned the sentence and called for its immediate nullification. They have informed Iran’s ambassador in Stockholm that any actions against an EU member will be considered an act against its entire members.

Mr. Ressam was arrested on 27 of June along with eight other embassy employees in Tehran. While the other eight were released, Mr. Ressom appeared in the second mass trial of post-election detainees and “confessed” to a series of self-incriminatory acts and the authorities have portrayed him as the “main strategist of Britain's behind the scenes efforts to create riots and unrest” in Tehran in the days following the June presidential elections.

Britain has denied all these accusations. Opposition forces also claim that all the so-called confessions in the mass trials of the election protesters are coerced.