The US Ministry of Justice said on Wednesday that Iranian had been charged for giving $ 300,000 to individuals in the United States to kill the former National Security Advisor to the White House.
Le Monde with AFP
Iran rejected, Thursday, August 11, the statements of American justice as to a conspiracy led by a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards to assassinate John Bolton, former National Security Advisor to the White House, the qualifying “ridiculous”. The US Ministry of Justice said on Wednesday that Iranian Shahram Persefi had been charged in his absence for having offered to pay 300,000 dollars to individuals in the United States to kill Mr. Bolton.
The conspiracy, apparently intended to avenge the death of the Iranian general Ghassem Soleimani, killed in January 2020 in Iraq by a strike ordered by the then president, Donald Trump, was revealed by the person supposed to assassinate Mr. Bolton, According to this same source. “American judicial authorities have brought charges without providing valid evidence,” Iranian Ministry of Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said in a statement. “This time, [the United States] wrote a scenario involving a character whose political career is over as Bolton,” he added.
According to the US Ministry of Justice, Shahram Pursafi came into contact at the end of 2021 with a person supposed to carry out the assassination, while the latter was in fact an informant of the federal police (FBI). The Iranian rushed to put the plan to execute before the second anniversary of the death of Soleimani.
Iranian warning
The powerful Iranian general, architect of the strategy of his country in the Middle East, was the head of the Al-Quds force, the unit responsible for external operations within the revolution guards. Mr. Kanani still rejected “baseless affirmations (…) made (…) to avoid responding to many terrorist crimes in which the United States government was directly involved, such as the cowardly assassination” of Soleimani. “The Islamic Republic firmly warns against any action aimed at Iranian citizens using ridiculous accusations,” he added.
The current national security advisor of the White House, Jake Sullivan, warned Wednesday that Tehran was exposed to “serious consequences” if he attacked American officials. The American accusations occur at the time when Tehran is studying a compromise presented by the European Union to save the 2015 Iranian nuclear agreement, moribund since the removal of the United States in 2018 from the United States under the leadership of Donald Trump , then advised by John Bolton.