Alireza Akbari’s grim fate seen as signal from Iran’s hardliners

Whether Iranian intelligence services genuinely believed Akbari was a spy is up for debate

I have to go. I am a soldier. It is my duty." Alireza Akbari was explaining to his family why he felt he had to answer a call by his former boss, Ali Shamkhani to return to Tehran in 2019 to help advise on how the country should respond to the fateful decision of Donald Trump to withdraw America from the Iran nuclear deal.

Some family members advised it might not be wise to do so since by 2019 the climate in the intelligence services was turning against Akbari's belief in the value of the nuclear deal and the lifting of western economic sanctions.