Iran to be held accountable for murder plot: US

US Vice President Joe Biden
© AFP/Getty Images/File Brendan Smialowski

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States warned on Wednesday it would hold Tehran accountable after foiling an alleged high-level Iranian plot to kill Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Washington.

“It is an outrageous act, where the Iranians will have to be held accountable,” US Vice President Joe Biden told ABC television’s “Good Morning America” program.

“The first thing we do is make sure the entire world and all of the capitals in the world understand what the Iranians had in mind,” Biden said.

In an explosive twist to a bitter face-off with the Islamic republic, the US Justice Department on Tuesday charged two men with conspiring with Iranian officials to assassinate Saudi ambassador to the United States Adel al-Jubeir.

The alleged Iranian scheme — which also sought to have enlisted Mexican drug cartels for help in obtaining explosives — involved detonating a bomb at a restaurant the envoy frequented, an act which could have claimed the lives of countless innocent patrons.

Biden told ABC that the heinous alleged murder plot would “unite the whole world in the moral disapprobation of the Iranians,” and that the global community would respond accordingly — possibly with a new round of sanctions.

“We’re in the process of uniting world public opinion continuing to isolate and condemn their behavior,” the vice president said.

“Nothing has been taken off the table.”

A criminal complaint in Washington on Tuesday named Manssor Arbabsiar, 56, a naturalized US citizen holding Iranian and US passports, and Gholam Shakuri, an Iran-based member of the Quds Force, a unit of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Shakuri remains at large while Arbabsiar was arrested on September 29 at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport and appeared in court Tuesday in Manhattan. His lawyer said he would plead not guilty, if charged.

The alleged attempt, dubbed a “Hollywood” scenario by one top US official, was broken open by a paid US source posing as a member of a “violent” Mexico-based drug cartel known for “numerous” assassinations and murders.

The defendants believed the cartel would provide explosives for an attack on the ambassador, according to the complaint.

Mexico said it cooperated closely with the US investigation, and said Arbabsiar was denied entry to the country and sent away on a flight to New York, where he was arrested by US authorities.

The allegations promise to aggravate already tense relations between the United States and Iran over Tehran’s nuclear program, its hardline rhetoric towards Israel and its support for militant groups in the Middle East.

Iran swiftly denied the plot charges, with officials accusing the United States of trying to divert attention from its domestic problems or sow discord in the Middle East between Iran and its Arab neighbors.

On Wednesday the speaker of Iran’s parliament, Ali Larijani, denounced the allegations as part of a “childish game” and “stupid mischief,” hours after Iran filed a formal complaint over the matter with the United Nations.

But US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington would consult its allies about how to “further isolate” Iran, and the European Union said Wednesday there would be “serious implications” if the plot were confirmed.

The Treasury Department froze US assets of Shakuri and Arbabsiar, and three other individuals it said were senior Quds Force officers involved in the case.

FBI Director Robert Mueller said Tuesday that the plot was disrupted before anyone was in imminent danger or explosives were bought, but could have caused carnage.

“Though it reads like the pages of a Hollywood script, the impact would have been very real and many lives would have been lost,” Mueller said.

US officials said the plot was infiltrated partly by a US Drug Enforcement Administration agent posing as a member of the cartel.

Officials in Washington alleged that in a series of meetings, Arbabsiar set up an international conspiracy by the Iranian government to pay the cartel $1.5 million to murder the ambassador.

Arbabsiar — with Shakuri’s approval — then facilitated the wiring of approximately $100,000 into a US bank account as a downpayment for the assassination attempt, the complaint said.

The Justice Department said Arbabsiar had confessed and provided testimony about the role of Iranian government elements.