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Swedish cosmetics worker charged in Iran

A Swedish-Iranian employee of cosmetics firm Oriflame has been charged in Iran for allegedly profiting from a pyramid scheme days after five of the company's employees were arrested amid suspicions of spying.

“He has been formally charged with establishing a pyramid scheme and deriving illegal earnings from it,” ministry spokeswoman Camilla Åkesson Lindblom told AFP.

She said the employee was a man in his thirties who held both Swedish and Iranian nationalities.

The Tehran office of Swedish direct-sales cosmetics company Oriflame was shut down by authorities on August 22 and five of its employees were arrested amid allegations that it was running a pyramid scheme and was possibly backed by a spy agency.

On Saturday, Iran’s intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi accused the firm of trying to harm Iran’s security.

“Oriflame intended to fight the (Iranian) system. There are no economic reasons behind the company,” he was quoted by state television as telling reporters at the Imam Khomeini mausoleum in Tehran.

The company’s chief financial officer said the company was not involved in any political activities and had not been told why its Iranian operations were shut down.

“We are a cosmetics company, we are selling direct. We are of course not involved in any political activities in the country. It is very very difficult to comment on” the accusations, Oriflame’s chief financial officer Gabriel Bennet told AFP.

“We are seeking a dialogue with the authorities but we need to know more about why we are in this situation before we can make any comments.”

“We are doing our utmost to solve the situation in Iran and especially for our colleagues being detained,” he added.

On Tuesday, Swedish foreign ministry officials held a meeting with Iran’s ambassador to Stockholm Rasoul Eslami to discuss Oriflame’s situation.

The case of Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother of two sentenced to death by stoning by an Iranian court, was also brought up, a ministry spokeswoman said.

Bennet said last Monday Oriflame believed the closure and arrests may be linked to its business model.

He told AFP then that the firm’s business model was to “sell cosmetics and give 40,000 Iranians, mainly women, a possibility to earn money through direct sales.”

He dismissed any reference to Oriflame operating a pyramid scheme as “ridiculous.”

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TRIAL

Danish terror trial begins against Iranian separatists

Three leaders of an Iranian Arab separatist group pleaded not guilty to financing and promoting terrorism in Iran with Saudi Arabia's backing, as their trial opened in Denmark on Thursday.

Danish terror trial begins against Iranian separatists
File photo: Mads Claus Rasmussen/Ritzau Scanpix

The three risk 12 years in prison if found guilty.

Aged 39 to 50, the trio are members of the separatist organisation ASMLA (Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz), which is based in Denmark and the Netherlands and which Iran considers a terrorist group.

The three, one of whom is a Danish citizen, have been held in custody in Denmark since February 2020.

Gert Dyrn, lawyer for the eldest of the three, told AFP that in his client’s opinion “what they are charged with is legitimate resistance towards an oppressive regime.”

“They are not denying receiving money from multiple sources, including Saudi Arabia, to help the movement and help them accomplish their political aim,” Dyrn said. 

His client has lived as a refugee in Denmark since 2006. 

According to the charge sheet seen by AFP, the three received around 30 million kroner (four million euros, $4.9 million) for ASMLA and its armed branch, through bank accounts in Austria and the United Arab Emirates.

The trio is also accused of spying on people and organisations in Denmark between 2012 and 2020 for Saudi intelligence.

Finally, they are also accused of promoting terrorism and “encouraging the activities of the terrorist movement Jaish Al-Adl, which has activities in Iran, by supporting them with advice, promotion, and coordinating attacks.”

The case dates back to 2018 when one of the three was the target of a foiled attack on Danish soil believed to be sponsored by the Iranian regime in retaliation for the killing of 24 people in Ahvaz, southwestern Iran, in September 2018.

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Tehran formally denied the attack plan in Denmark, but a Danish court last year jailed a Norwegian-Iranian for seven years for his role in the plot. 

That attack put Danish authorities on the trail of the trio’s ASMLA activities.

Sunni Saudi Arabia is the main rival in the Middle East of Shia Iran, and Tehran regularly accuses it, along with Israel and the United States, of supporting separatist groups.

Lawyer Gert Dyrn said this was “the first case in Denmark within terror law where you have to consider who is a terrorist and who is a freedom fighter.”

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