Gholamhossein Mohseni Eje'i, spokesman for the Iranian judiciary, said in a weekly press briefing in Tehran on Sunday that a US citizen who was also a national of a second country had been convicted for being “an infiltrating American agent”, according to Mizan Online, a news agency affiliated with the judiciary. Mohseni Eje'i did not identify the accused but Mizan later named him as Xiyue Wang, 37, a graduate student in history at Princeton. "This person, who was gathering intelligence and was directly guided by the US, was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but the sentence can be appealed," he said on state television. Mohseni Eje'i explained that the person had opened his path to Iran by some sophisticated means - that he did not explain - but was identified by the intelligence bodies and arrested. A Princeton statement emailed to the Guardian confirmed Wang's trip to Iran, and said that “Xiyue Wang is a fourth-year doctoral candidate … in the Department of History at Princeton University. His field is late 19th- and early 20th-century Eurasian history. He was in Iran last summer solely for the purpose of doing scholarly research on the administrative and cultural history of the late Qajar dynasty in connection with his PhD dissertation". Mizan said Wang pursued espionage “through the cover of being a researcher”. The accused, the agency said, had been working on a digital archive for “the world’s biggest anti-Iran spying organization”. The allegations were based on an anonymous “informed source”, it said. “He entered the country under the cover of a master’s student,” the report said, “but has been gathering secret and top secret [intelligence]” for organizations such as “the US state department … the Harvard Kennedy School” and the British Institute of Persian Studies. Wang was accused of infiltrating Iran’s national archive and building a 4,500-page digital archive. Source: http://en.farsnews.com/newstext.aspx?nn=13960426000475 ===================================================================== 4500 page digital archive... DAYUM ! Sounds pretty much copying the entire state archives to me. I hope Pers brothers get to the bottom of all this and manage to extract info aboot (Canadian about) who made the analysis and saw that "crack" on the archive's wall that could have been infiltrated through via an Iranian-ally looking dude like this. Seriously tho, if Ayatollah Mike's the guy who has given the green light to this, I'd be really careful because Mr Wang may just be a bait that meant to be considered by the target country's intelligence officers as one of those; "it-was-pretty-hard-to-get-to-him-so-he-can-be-no-baits-pops" sort of spies... That sort of bait wrap always smells like Ayatollah Mike ! Wow. Check ma rhyme theh bruh... (Yeessss, lil bidduh Brooklyn breeze don't do no harm)
Generally Chinese are spying everywhere for benefits of China.It is a well-known fact therefore serious big companies afraid to employ Chinese in important positions.
Astonishingly I agree with Ostap (don't blink it's unlikely to last) I'd be interested to see some more background on Xiyue Wang, think he was spying for China. It's been there done that for the Americans, you'd think they would know by now the "I'm a student student not a spy" cover have been blown decades ago. ps. why is no one posting about the Iranian spies in Saudi Arabia? http://english.alarabiya.net/en/New...-of-citizens-accused-of-spying-for-Iran-.html
Because Saudi Arabia, allied with the US and flirting with Israel, must appear as the big bad bully in the neighborhood, harassing innocent peaceful Iran. A report on Iranian spies in Saudi Arabia would chip a corner of this idyllic modern Pieta of Iran mourning over the deceased world peace. On the other hand, an American spy in Iran is just what the Ayatollah's doctor prescribed for improving Iran's image while denigrating their satan-ish enemy. Add to it the common paranoia found in huge quantities in every dictatorship out there, and you'll have a complete guide to understanding articles from Farsnews. I don't believe a word of it, by the way.
thats most bias comment i heard, you do know almost all the spy are white. big company employ plenty chinese-american, and H1B foreigner from china/india see google, intel, cisco etc etc. also there was a news few month ago where china destroy spy cell in china that was working for US, so those chinese were working for US too. if the guy is a spy, he would spying for america. since china and iran has very good relationship, and no reason for iran to damage sino-iran relation.
you do know china and iran has a very good relationship, iran freely give china info, they dont even need a spy in iran. its the american in iran that will be an issue.
yes I know they have a good relationship, I also know it would be naive to think allies don't spy on one another. China have taken some aggressive steps lately and I would like to see some more background info on Xiyue Wang before I claim him to be an American spy.
he may not be spy, he may just regular american who goto the wrong country, at the wrong time. If he is chinese citizen, iran wont even made the arrest. China would be pretty dumb to have an american to spy on iran There are plenty chinese-american or other naturalized american working for US. during WWII we have japanese-american help US decipher japanese communication, and fight japanese along side of other americans.
I just find the forum sometimes have people from other countries with a different point of view and was wondering what the story was behind the Saudi's arrest of so called spies and only hours ago Kuwait ordering Iran's ambassador to leave. I don't have time to manage a thread atm.
maybe... unfortunately for him he downloaded 4500 pages without asking... I'm civilian even I would ask first they should at least check what he downloaded... wonder what he downloaded
could be, he might not understanding the law there, and thinking its ok to download public records for study, just like here in US.
I think this one is about a graduate guy acting as being there to make research for his doctorate. I don't think any companies involved.
Too bad for him if he's innocent. I wonder if he could even read what he was downloading fast enough to assess if it would be applicable to his doctorate. Not too many US citizens are that skilled in Persian.
