The European Union slammed what it called "a brutal act of senseless violence" and demanded an end to executions in Iran.

Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard told AFP that she found out late Tuesday that the sentence was likely to be carried out.

"We immediately contacted Tehran, of course, and I tried to arrange a meeting with my counterpart to ask him to immediately suspend the execution, but unfortunately, he was unavailable," she told AFP.

She did not identify the person executed.

Iran's judiciary news agency Mizan Online said a man named Kouroush Keyvani was executed for spying for Israel, and that he was arrested during Iran's 12-day war with Israel in June last year.

It listed alleged meetings with agents from Israel's Mossad spy agency and said he had received training in "six European countries and in Tel Aviv".

This was the first public announcement of an execution since Israel and the United States launched strikes on Iran on February 28, triggering the war that has spread across the Middle East.

The man obtained Swedish citizenship in 2019. When asked about the reasons for his trip to Iran, Stenergard declined to comment.

Since his arrest, "we have done everything in our power to try to change this situation. We have been in contact at various levels, both in Stockholm and in Tehran," the minister said.

- Access denied -

Sweden had made several requests for consular access. "But Iran does not consider this person a Swedish citizen and therefore did not grant this access," Stenergard said.

In a separate statement, she said she had received the news that the execution had been carried out with "dismay".

"It is obvious to us that the legal process which led to the execution of the Swedish citizen was not conducted in accordance with the rule of law," she added in the statement.

Late Wednesday, EU's top diplomat Kaja Kallas said that "The execution of a Swedish citizen by the Iranian regime is a brutal act of senseless violence and we condemn it."

"The appalling human rights situation in Iran and the alarming increase in executions are intolerable and show the regime's true colours," Kallas added, calling on Iran to end all executions.

According to the NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), two more people were hanged in 2026 following espionage convictions: Ali Ardestani on January 7 and Hamidreza Sabet Esmailpour on January 28.

The NGO documented at least 13 similar executions in 2025.

During the war last year, a significant number of people were arrested, accused of spying for Israel.

Iran has arrested hundreds of people in recent days suspected of collaborating with Israel and the United States, according to local media reports.

On Sunday, police chief Ahmad-Reza Radan spoke of the arrest of 500 people suspected of espionage and of "passing information to the enemy and anti-Iranian media".

Another Swedish-Iranian, Ahmadreza Djalali, has been imprisoned in Iran for nearly 10 years. He was convicted in 2017 of collaborating with Mossad.