Iran's judiciary spokesman Gholam- Hossein Mohseni-Ejei said Monday that the country's Supreme Court has overturned the death penalty to a CIA "spy," which was issued by a lower court, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.

"As far as I remember, the case of the defendant was sent to the country's Supreme Court after his appeal, and finally the ( death) sentence was overturned... So the (case) was returned" to the court for retrial," Ejei, also Iran's prosecutor general, told reporters.

In January, an Iranian court sentenced an Iranian-American, Amir Hekmati, to death over the charges of "cooperating with hostile government of the United States, membership in the CIA and an attempt to accuse Iran of terrorism."

In the court session, Hekmati confessed that he intended to penetrate Iran's intelligence systems to help the CIA and said he was deceived by the U.S. intelligence agency, according to Fars.

On Dec. 17, 2011, Iran's intelligence ministry announced that it had arrested a U.S. spy in the country. The ministry said in a statement that the spy is a CIA analyst tasked with infiltrating Iran's intelligence apparatus.

On Dec. 20, a U.S. government official denied that the arrested U.S. citizen is a spy. When asked if the U.S. government believed that Hekmati has been falsely accused of espionage, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said "we do."