"Abducted" Iranian arrives in Tehran, claims was tortured

An Iranian man who claims he was abducted by United States intelligence forces denied on Thursday that he was a nuclear scientist and claimed to have been interrogated by Israelis and undergone mental torture in the US. He made the statements shortly after greeting his family at the airport in the Iranian capital of Tehran. 

Reuters

Shahram Amiri vanished from Saudia Arabia in June 2009 while on a pilgrimage and resurfaced in Iran's Interest Section in Washington on Tuesday.

Iranian officials claim Amiri was kidnapped by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), while US media reported he defected to Washington.

Amiri himself contradicted both US and Iranian officials' claims that he was a nuclear scientist.

"I am a simple researcher who works in a university which is open to all and there is no secret work happening there", he told reporters.

Amiri claims the US government used him for "political pressure" and that he has never worked on nuclear development.

"I had nothing to do with Natanz and Fordo sites", he said, referring to Iran's two uranium enrichment plants.

The Washinton Post reported Thursday Amiri was paid five million dollars by the CIA to provide intelligence on Iran's nuclear program.

The Post quotes unnamed officials as saying Amiri may have left the US "out of concern that the Tehran government would harm his family".

Amiri said the US offered him 50 million dollars if he stayed in the US and assured they would bring his family from Iran, but said that during his captivity there were "threats issued against my family".

He said his kidnapping was "psychological warfare against Iran" and that during the initial two months of captivity, he was put through the "harshest mental torture.

"There were interrogators from Israel present in some sessions", he said, "and it was evident that they had planned to move me to Israel."

Amiri also said he was "really amazed" by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's suggestion Wednesday that he had freely gone to the US and was free to go whenever he wanted.

"I was not free there, and I was under the control of armed people of the intelligence service", he said.

The unnamed official quoted in the Washington Post report indicated the money Amiri received was now "beyond his reach", but that his loss may have come at a high cost in terms of intelligence.

"The (financial) support is keyed to what the person's done, including how their material has checked out over time", the official said.

"You don't give something for nothing."