Two Swedish-Iranian brothers are on trial for spying for Iran

According to The Swedish newspaper ExpressenStockholm District Court began planning on Thursday for a meeting with prosecutors and defense lawyers ahead of the upcoming trial.

The details of the case against them are not very transparent as the prosecutors Per Lindqvist and Mats Ljungqvist have said very little about the content of the accusations. Formal charges against the two are expected in the coming months and their trial will not be open to the public. Lawyers for both brothers have so far maintained that their clients are innocent.

Both brothers, who were born in Iran but came to Sweden as children in 1994, are accused of espionage from March 2011 until their arrest in September and November last year and are currently being held in strict isolation at Kronoberg Prison.

The Swedish newspaper did not mention their names but before reports at the time of the arrest revealed their identities like Peyman Kia, now 42 years old, and his brother Payam, who is 35 years old.

The older brother of the couple is said to have worked as an investigator and spent time within the Security Police (SÄPO) as well as working for military intelligence and the Office for Special Acquisition (KSI), one of Sweden’s most secretive intelligence agencies. The younger brother has also worked for SÄPO for a shorter period.

Tensions are relatively high between Iran and Sweden around a Swedish court sentence former Iranian prison guard Hamid Nouri to life in prison over executions of political prisoners in 1988.