14. Iranian Nuclear Scientist a Redefector

Iranian Nuclear Scientist a Redefector.

Shahram Amiri, an Iranian scientist who a U.S. official says was paid $5 million for information on Iran's nuclear programs, returned July 15, 2010 to Iran. He thus became a redefector, an individual who defects to an adversary and then undergoes a change of heart and returns home.

Nigel West (Historical Dictionary of International Intelligence. Lanham, MD: The Scarecrow Press, 2006, p. 214) gives examples of the few who have redefected form the U.S. The most notorious is KGB’s Vitali Yurchenko who had defected to the CIA in Rome in July 1985, then three months later turned himself in to the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C. He held a press conference where he claimed he had been abducted and drugged.

Amiri’s story is not so different. The U.S. says he was a willing defector who changed his mind and decided to board a plane home from Washington. Amiri has told a very different tale, claiming he was snatched while on a pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia and bundled off to the United States to be harshly interrogated and offered millions of dollars by the CIA to speak against Iran.

U.S. officials have insisted that Amiri was neither kidnapped nor coerced into leaving Iran and that he made the decision to come to the U.S. without his family. The U.S. official added that Amiri decided to return to Iran in order to see his family again.

In Tehran, Iranian lawmaker Amir Taherkhani boasted that Amiri's return "shows the strength of the Islamic republic." Another prominent parliament member, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, called the alleged kidnapping a "terrorist act."
It remains unclear how Iranian authorities will ultimately deal with Amiri -- and the U.S. claims he cooperated with American authorities -- despite his hero-style welcome.

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki called Amiri a "dear compatriot" and said Iran was keenly interested in learning more about the reasons for his alleged abduction.
The CIA agreed to pay Shahram Amiri a $5 million fee to provide intelligence, but Amiri could not carry the money back with him. The money paid Amiri came from a secret program aimed at inducing scientists and others with information on Iran's nuclear program to defect, according to The Washington Post.

Anything he got from the CIA now far beyond his reach, owing to the financial sanctions on Iran. Iran's leaders are expected to use Amiri to ring up as many propaganda points as possible against Washington - showing that relations remain in a deep freeze and hopes of breakthrough talks appear as distant as ever.

The conflicting accounts about Amiri - whether he was a captive of the Americans or a homesick defector - are unlikely to alter the Western-led pressure on Iran over its nuclear program. It also gives the ruling clerics a welcome distraction at a time when domestic protests are growing over Iran's stumbling economy and worries about the fallout from international sanctions.

At first Amiri claimed the CIA "pressured me to help with their propaganda against Iran," he said, including offering him up to $10 million to talk to U.S. media and claim to have documents on a laptop against Iran. He said he refused to take the money. Also, back in Tehran, Amiri also sought to play down his role in Iran's nuclear program - which Washington and allies fear could be used to create atomic weapons. Iran says it only seeks energy-producing reactors. "I am a simple researcher who was working in the university," he said. "I'm not involved in any confidential jobs. I had no classified information."