The Australian academic who languished in an Iranian jail on unfounded spying charges has revealed her captors tried to recruit her as a double-agent.
THE Australian academic who languished in an Iranian jail on unfounded spying charges for more than two years has revealed her captors tried to recruit her as a double-agent.
Kylie Moore-Gilbert endured a harrowing 804 days in prison, including seven months in solitary confinement, after being convicted of espionage, and says before her release the notorious Iranian Revolutionary Guard asked her to turn spy for Iran.
“I knew that the reason that they didn‘t engage in any meaningful negotiations with the Australians (for my release) was because they wanted to recruit me, they wanted me to work for them as a spy,” Ms Moore-Gilbert has told Sky News in world exclusive interview.
She said the Iranian authorities directly asked her to become a spy “many times”.
“(They said) that if I co-operated with them and agreed to become a spy for them, they would free me,” she said.
“I could win my freedom.”
Dr Moore-Gilbert described the move as Iran wanting to “have their cake and eat it too,” by getting something out of a release deal with Australia as well as gaining a double-agent who could be useful in other parts of the world.
Read the article by Clare Armstrong in The Daily Telegraph.