Federal prosecutors charge Iranian Revolutionary Guards official in assassination plot on US soil
CNN
Federal prosecutors in New York have charged a high-ranking official in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and three other people with connections to the Iranian government in an alleged plot to kill a New York-based journalist and human rights activist who is critical of the Iranian government.
Federal prosecutors in New York have charged a high-ranking official in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and three other people with connections to the Iranian government in an alleged plot to kill a New York-based journalist and human rights activist who is critical of the Iranian government. The charges made public Tuesday against the official, Ruhollah Bazghandi, are the first to accuse an Iranian government official by name in the alleged plot to kill journalist Masih Alinejad. In addition to the charges against Bazghandi and three others, three additional men who are allegedly part of an Eastern European criminal organization with ties to Iran were charged in the same murder-for-hire plot last year and are in custody. Prosecutors allege they were enlisted to carry out the assassination of Alinejad in the United States. “We will not tolerate efforts by an authoritarian regime like Iran to undermine the fundamental rights guaranteed to every American,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement Tuesday. “Three of the defendants charged in this horrific plot are now in U.S. custody, and we will never stop working to identify, find, and bring to justice all those who endanger the safety of the American people.” Alinejad posted on X Tuesday that “the revelation that the assassination plot against me in July 2022 was orchestrated by Ali Khamenei’s IRGC is a stark reminder of the brutal lengths to which the Islamic regime will go to silence dissidents, even those far beyond Iran’s borders.” She vowed to “continue advocating … for the rights of the Iranian people to secure democracy and free themselves from dictatorship, no matter the risks.” ”Despite moving 21 times between safe houses, I have a message for @khamenei_ir,” Alinejad wrote, tagging Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in the post.
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