An Iranian Foreign Ministry official dismissed reports that Iranian academic Shahram Amiri who was "abducted" by the U.S. last year and was recently released is a nuclear scientist, the local satellite Press TV reported on Thursday.
"Shahram Amiri is not a nuclear scientist and we reject it," Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hassan Qashqavi told reporters at Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport.
He is a researcher at one of the universities in Iran, Qashqavi was quoted as saying.
Amiri, 32, who had gone missing on a pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia in June last year and arrived in Tehran early in the morning, told reporters that he was kidnapped by the CIA and the abduction was part of the U.S. campaign to add political pressures to Iran over its nuclear program.
The Iranian scholar said he is just a "simple researcher," without any expertise on nuclear technology, or knowledge and access to Iran's nuclear sites.
"I had nothing to do with Natanz and Fordo sites," he added.