ISTANBUL: A senior national security official has fled Iran, taking with him hundreds of classified documents, it was revealed yesterday.

Touraj Esmaeeli, an adviser working for the cyber and missile department of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, is said to have taken refuge in a Western country’s consulate in Istanbul, according to Iran opposition news websites.

The official disappeared after attending a meeting in Tehran on January 13 and was thought to have been arrested like three of his high-ranking colleagues, the Islamic State of Iran Crime Research Centre said on its website.

The three were held as part of a crackdown that started in April and charged with spying, the centre said.

Alireza Zarifian, the director of the centre for communication and information of the General Secretariat of National Security, Admiral Eessaa Golverdi and Ghafoor Dorgazi, both of whom were deputies in the operations department of the National Security Council, remain in custody. The council’s secretary Ali Shamkhani has yet to comment on either one of the four cases.

A source close to Shamkhani has admitted that Esmaeeli succeeded in fleeing to Turkey, where he was hiding at Istanbul’s Avant Garde Taksim Hotel.

Confidential sources have reported that on Sunday, Iranian intelligence agency (Etelaat) in co-operation with Turkish intelligence agency MIT raided the hotel.

Esmaeeli, however, was able to flee in time and take refuge in one of the consulates.

According to reports, the Supreme National Security Council is scrambling to alter, update and delete strategies regarding cyber activities to compensate for leaks that could arise from the documents in Esmaeeli’s possession.

Persian-speaking opposition site AVA Today also reported on the Iranian security adviser fleeing the country with hundreds of documents.

“Touraj Esmaeeli, a top adviser working for the cyber department of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, fled the country on Tuesday, drawing out hundreds of classified documents,” it said.