Nouri’s lawyers have appealed the preliminary ruling in the case on the grounds that the Swedish court that issued the verdict wrongly established its jurisdiction and that Swedish law was not properly observed.
The lawyers argued that in order for a Swedish court to have jurisdiction, the individual subject to prosecution should be present in Sweden of his own volition, a provision that they claimed had not been met in Nouri’s case, who they said had been tricked into traveling to Sweden.
They also argued in appealing the early ruling that the Swedish court should clearly state an interest in establishing an international jurisdiction, while it was unclear how Sweden would benefit from Nouri’s case.
The Swedish appeals court is due to issue its verdict on Monday.
The Swedish court issued the life imprisonment verdict against Nouri in July, after 93 trial sessions that 50 people attended as plaintiffs and witnesses, all of them members of the anti-Iran Mojahedin-e-Khalq terrorist group or their relatives.
Nouri was arrested in Sweden in 2019. Iran has called for his immediate release and reparations for the damage caused by his “illegal” detention.
The Mojahedin-e-Khalq group is responsible for the deaths of thousands of Iranians in terrorist attacks in Iran after the 1979 revolution.
The group had been on a United States blacklist of terrorist organizations for decades but was delisted under former US President Barack Obama.
