Iran arrests employee of London-based opposition TV channel fleeing country

Times of Israel – Nov10th 2022

Iran has arrested an employee of a London-based opposition news station as an “agent” suspected of fueling recent anti-regime rioting, the country’s semi-official Fars news agency reported Thursday.

The Iran International worker was stopped while trying to flee the Islamic Republic, it said.

“Recently, the agent carried out numerous activities and actions in slandering the Islamic Republic, inviting youth to riot and creating terror among the people,” according to the report.

Iran accuses Iran International, a Persian-language satellite news channel once majority-owned by a Saudi national, of stoking recent nationwide protests that have escalated into deadly violence. The broadcaster in recent days said the Metropolitan Police warned that two of its British-Iranian journalists faced threats from Iran that “represent an imminent, credible and significant risk to their lives and those of their families.”

On Tuesday, Iran’s intelligence minister, Esmail Khatib, called Iran International a “terrorist” organization, Reuters reported.

The arrest came as protests in Iran raged on streets into Thursday, with demonstrators holding a 40th-day remembrance for a bloody crackdown in the country’s southeast, even as the nation’s intelligence minister and army chief renewed threats against local dissent and the broader world.

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