PROFESSOR DIES IN TEHRAN JAIL.

DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES• An IranianCanadian university professor detained in Tehran has died in custody, activists and a family member said Sunday, marking the latest suspicious death of a detainee in Iran after a crackdown on dissent following nationwide protests.

They identified the professor as Kavous Seyed-Emami, a 63-year-old professor of sociology at Imam Sadeq University in Tehran and the managing director of the Persian Heritage Wildlife Foundation. His son and the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran say that authorities told Seyed-Emami’s family that he committed suicide in custody, something they described as suspicious following other detainee deaths.

Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi later confirmed the professor’s death on Sunday, saying he had been detained in an alleged espionage ring. The prosecutor on Saturday announced the ring, saying it had targeted people who were “implementing scientific and environmental projects” to collect information on “strategic areas.”

“He knew there were a lot of confessions against him and he also confessed himself,” Dolatabadi was quoted as saying Sunday by the semi-official ILNA news agency. “Unfortunately, he committed suicide in prison.”

The professor’s son, musician Ramin Seyed-Emami who performs under the stage name King Raam, wrote on Instagram that his father had died following his arrest on Jan. 24.

“They say he committed suicide. I still can’t believe this,” he wrote.

Global Affairs Canada said it was aware of reports of Seyed-Emami’s death. An Iranian reformist lawmaker, Mahmoud Sadeghi, tweeted that he failed to get information on Seyed-Emami’s death despite calls to “related officials.”

Iran entered the New Year with nationwide protests sweeping across 75 cities and towns. The demonstrations initially focused on Iran’s poor economy despite its nuclear deal with world powers, but quickly spiralled into chants directly challenging Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and its theocratic government.

Activists say they have concerns about Iran’s prisons and jails being overcrowded and dangerous, pointing to allegations of torture, abuse and deaths that followed the mass arrests during Iran’s 2009 Green Movement protests. Since the most-recent protests, activists have said they also remain concerned by reported suicides within Iran’s prison system.

Analysts and family members of dual nationals and others detained in Iran have suggested that hardliners in the Islamic Republic’s security agencies use the prisoners as bargaining chips for money or influence. A UN panel in September described “an emerging pattern involving the arbitrary deprivation of liberty of dual nationals” in Iran, which Tehran denies.