Iran ready to consider the evidence in alleged assassination plot
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REPORTING FROM TEHRAN -- Tehran is willing to look at the evidence supporting U.S. claims that Iranian officials backed a foiled plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said Monday.
‘We are ready to examine with deliberation any issue, even if it was fabricated,’ Salehi was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency.
He said Iran has asked U.S. authorities to provide information about the alleged plot, but added that Saudi authorities were aware that ‘this scenario aims to drive a wedge between regional countries.’
Iranian officials have denounced U.S. claims as an effort to discredit the Islamic republic. Washington and Tehran have long been adversaries, while Saudi Arabia is a close U.S. ally. Iran and Saudi Arabia are rivals vying for influence in the Middle East.
On Sunday, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that the country would respond robustly to any ‘evil move’ or western ‘conspiracy’ triggered by the alleged plot.
‘Any inappropriate measure against Iran, whether political or security related, will be strongly confronted by the Iranian nation,’ Khamenei told a group of academics, state television reported.
U.S. authorities have charged two men -- an Iranian American who was living in Texas and a member of Iran’s Quds Force, an elite special actions unit -- with conspiring to kill the Saudi diplomat, Adel Al-Jubeir.
Iran has demanded the right to visit the Iranian American suspect, Manssor Arbabsiar, in U.S. custody. The other suspect has not been apprehended.
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-- Ramin Mostaghim