Argentina's highest criminal court concluded Thursday that the bloody 1994 attack on a Jewish center in Buenos Aires was planned by Iran and carried out by the Hezbollah militia, in retaliation for the South American country's decision to break a nuclear cooperation agreement.
“The 1994 attack in Buenos Aires was organized, planned, financed and executed under the direction of the authorities of the Islamic State of Iran, within the framework of Islamic Jihad, and with the main intervention of the political and military organization Hezbollah,” held a criminal cassation court in a ruling to which he had access The Associated Press.
The court also declared the attack a “crime against humanity” and, therefore, imprescriptible, in a case in which after three decades no material or intellectual perpetrator has been tried or convicted for both attacks.
The judicial resolution identifies the highest officials of the Iranian government at the time as responsible, including the president, several ministers and commanders of the public forces.
“It is a historic ruling, unique in Argentina. They owed it to the victims,” highlighted the president of the Delegation of Argentine Israeli Associations (DAIA), Jorge Knoblovits.
The community leader stressed that the ruling is also politically timely, historically just at a time that marks 30 years since the attack (AMIA) and six months since the Hamas massacre against Israel.
The accusation against Iran is not new and is the hypothesis that has prevailed in the investigations of multiple prosecutors and judges in charge of the investigations in the last three decades.
On July 18, 1994, an explosion destroyed the headquarters of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) in Buenos Aires and left 85 dead and more than 300 injured.
Two years earlier, another attack had demolished the Israeli embassy building in Buenos Aires, with 20 dead and 242 injured.
The conclusions of the Criminal Cassation respond to appeals in a collateral case against judicial officials convicted of irregularities in the investigation of the attack against AMIA.
According to the court, the motivation for both terrorist attacks “originated mainly in the unilateral decision of the Argentine government (motivated by a change in the foreign policy of our country that occurred between the end of 1991 and mid-1992) to terminate three contracts for the provision of nuclear material and technology agreed upon with the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
The cooperation agreement had been signed in the mid-1980s by the then government of center-left President Raúl Alfonsín (1983-1989). It was canceled in 1992 by his successor, center-right President Carlos Menem, who had aligned himself with the United States.
“The final response of the Iranian State to Argentine non-compliance was, ultimately and on this occasion, the use of a methodology based on the execution of acts of terrorism by Hezbollah,” the judges concluded.
In the ruling, the three members of the court identified those responsible for the attack against AMIA as those who then held the highest positions in the Iranian government: President Ali Akbar Hashemi Bahramaie Rafsanjani; Ali Fallahijan (Iranian Minister of Information), Ali Akbar Velayati (Minister of Foreign Affairs), Mohsen Rezai (in charge of the Revolutionary Guard Corps) and Ahmad Vahidi (head of “Al Quds”).
Also accused are Imad Fayez Moughnieh (then head of Political Intelligence and head of Hezbollah's Foreign Service) and former diplomats at the Iranian embassy in Buenos Aires Mohsen Rabbani, Ahmad Reza Asghari and Hadi Soleimanpour.
Tehran has always denied the charges.
In light of the court ruling, Israel asked Argentina to declare the Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz explained in a statement on Friday that he spoke with his Argentine counterpart, Diana Mondino, on Thursday night to convey the request.
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