The official IRNA news agency said the men were convicted of planning to target a factory in 2022 belonging to Iran’s defence ministry and involved in missile and defence equipment in the central city of Isfahan. The operation was allegedly engineered by Mossad and the four were trained by the Israeli agency in an African country before entering Iran, it said.

The four were identified as Iranian nationals: Mohammad Faramarzi, Mohsen Mazloum, Vafa Azarbar and Pejman Fatehi. The execution was carried out after Iran’s Supreme Court upheld their death sentences, handed down by another court in September.