Iran’s intelligence minister has personally stepped in to deny a widely circulated unsourced news item on the Internet linking the head of the judiciary’s daughter to espionage.

“None of the members of Larijani family is suspected of espionage”, said Mahmoud Alavi on October 3.

Earlier, a news website, Amadnews, had reported, “Zahra Ardeshir Larijani (known as Mrs. Vahid), daughter of [the head of the judiciary, Ayatollah] Sadeq Amoli Larijani has been accused of espionage for the West and a ‘top secret dossier’ has been filed for her.”

However, responding to a question raised by Iran Students News Agency, the intelligence minister said, “The only professional reference for discernment of espionage activities in Iran is the department of counterespionage run by the deputy of the intelligence minister. So far, the department has not seen any evidence for suspecting the members of Larijani’s family of espionage”.

Alavi insisted the news linking Larijani’s daughter to espionage was made up to harm people’s trust in Iran’s senior authorities.

Furthermore, Alavi denied a number of rumors currently circulating saying President Hassan Rouhani had personally ordered an investigation into one of Larijani’s relatives who has been accused of espionage.

“These rumors are fundamentally false; therefore, all other rumors around it are also baseless and created by the imagination of those who have some [ulterior] designs,” he said.

The head of Judiciary, ayatollah Larijani, is considered close to the Supreme leader, ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the hardliners.

Amadnews, on October 1, reported, “After Zahra Larijani’s espionage for the British Embassy in Iran was discovered, one of the supreme leader’s aides, Vahid Haqqanian, directly ordered the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ intelligence apparatus to arrest her.”

Earlier, Amadnews had maintained Larijani had recently tried to force the Intelligence Ministry’s counterespionage department to cover up the case.

It is not clear if Amadnews is based in Iran or abroad, but well-informed sources believe it has connections within the regime in Iran.

Meanwhile, on October 3, a conservative MP, Nader Qazipour, denied another unsourced news released by “an anti-Islamic Revolution website.”

According to Qazipour, the website had reported that the speaker of the Iranian Parliament, Ali Larijani, a brother of the judiciary head, is a naturalized Canadian citizen and his children have traveled to Canada.

Qazipour asked the Information and Communications Technology Ministry to seriously confront the site.