Kylie Moore-Gilbert: Iranian Authorities Asked Me to Spy for Them
Kylie Moore-Gilbert, who was imprisoned in Iran for two years, has stated that Islamic Republic authorities “repeatedly asked her to spy for them.” The Australian citizen has sharply criticized the approach of the Australian government toward her case.
Kylie Moore-Gilbert, a British-Australian researcher who was released from an Iranian prison in December, said in her first interview with Sky News that Islamic Republic authorities “repeatedly asked her to spy for them.”
Gilbert, who was imprisoned in Iran for two years, said: “I know that the reason they [Islamic Republic authorities] did not participate in any negotiations with the Australians was that they wanted to employ me.”
In this interview, which was released on Tuesday, March 9 (March 19 in Persian calendar), she also spoke of the harassment and mistreatment she experienced in Iranian prison. Gilbert said she was held in a “two-meter by two-meter box that had no toilet, no television, and nothing else.”
The researcher even contemplated suicide and escape from prison.
She also criticized the Australian government’s approach to her case, which kept behind-the-scenes negotiations with Islamic Republic authorities for her release hidden from the media. Gilbert said: “I think if my torture had been made public, a 10-year prison sentence would never have been issued against me. But there was no clarity, no attention, no one to hold them accountable.”
According to her, after her arrest became public news, “more attention to her” improved her physical and mental health.
Moore-Gilbert was arrested by the IRGC Intelligence Organization in 2018 and sentenced to 10 years in prison on espionage charges. She was released in December in exchange for the freedom of three Iranian prisoners in Thailand who were accused of terrorist activities.
