Iran police arrest foreign woman for spying

By Mitra Amiri

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian border police have arrested a foreign woman on suspicion of spying, a police official told state radio on Saturday.

The semi-official Fars new agency initially quoted Ahmad Geravand, deputy commander of state border police, as telling a news conference his guards had seized a "female American spy," but Geravand later said her nationality was not clear.

The woman was captured at Jolfa, on Iran's northern border with Azerbaijan, close to Armenia. Fars said she had entered from Armenia.

"On January 5 a woman with foreign citizenship who was at the Jolfa border filming police stations and all the border traffic with advanced cameras was arrested by Jolfa border forces," Geravand told national radio in an interview.

"She once said she was an American citizen but at other times she said she was a Swiss citizen. She mentioned the names of different countries," he said.

The ISNA news agency quoted Geravand as saying the woman was "on a mission for the Americans to film the borders" and had been turned over to the intelligence ministry.

Initial reports of the arrest emerged earlier this week. Fars said on Thursday that a 55-year-old U.S. woman identified as Hall Talayan had been arrested trying to cross the border without a visa, and espionage equipment was found in her teeth.

Later that day, however, Iran's Arabic language television al-Alam said the arrest report was false.