Former Energy Minister Gonen Segev, arrested recently on allegations of espionage for Israel's archfoe Iran claimed in his interrogation he set out "to become a double agent and help Israel," Israeli media reported Tuesday.
The Shin Bet security agency revealed Monday that Segev, 62, was extradited from Equatorial Guinea in May and arrested upon arrival in Israel on suspicion of "committing offenses of aiding the enemy and spying against the State of Israel."
The agency said Segev had contacted officials at the Iranian Embassy in Nigeria in 2012 and visited Iran twice for meetings with his handlers.
According to details released Tuesday, Segev claimed that he briefed Israeli defense officials on his intention to contact Iranian intelligence officials and expected to receive orders from his Israeli handlers.
He asserted that not only did his action never compromised Israel's national security, they benefited it.
He said his actions stemmed from his desire to rehabilitate his public image, which was tainted in 2006 when he was imprisoned for drug smuggling.
Segev was transferred Tuesday from a special Shin Bet facility where he had been held since his arrest to the criminal ward in the maximum security Gilboa Prison in northern Israel. Sources familiar with the investigation said that the fact Segev was placed in the criminal ward indicates he poses little threat to national security.
Iran, for its part, has dismissed the report.
Iranian government spokesman Mohammad Bagher Nobakht told reporters in Tehran that the "Zionist regime uses every tool to blame the Islamic Republic of Iran. I suggest ignoring these reports."
The arrest made headlines in Arab media, which said that Segev and his handlers were under Shin Bet surveillance for several years.
Lebanon's Al-Akhbar newspaper, which is affiliated with Hezbollah and its Iranian patrons, lauded the "unprecedented achievement of Iranian intelligence" which it said "shocked" Israel.
