US Unveils Iranian Plan to Assassinate Former Adviser John Bolton

First modification: 08/11/2022 – 04:03

A scenario worthy of a spy movie: US justice revealed on Wednesday, August 10, that a member of the Revolutionary Guard, the ideological Army of the Republic of Iran, had hatched a plan to assassinate John Bolton between October 2021 and April 2022. Donald Trump’s former National Security Advisor had been one of the strongest advocates of Washington’s withdrawal from the nuclear agreement with Iran.

The US Justice Department said in a statement that Shahram Poursafi, alias Mehdi Rezayi, 45, was charged in absentia with offering to pay individuals in the United States $300,000 to kill John Bolton, who was also a US ambassador. United States at the UN.

The plot, ostensibly to avenge the death of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a US strike in January 2020, was revealed to authorities by the person who was supposed to assassinate John Bolton. His identity has not been revealed.

The accusations of the American Justice take place while the Iranian regime studies a compromise proposed by the European Union to save the Iranian nuclear agreement of 2015, moribund since the United States withdrew in 2018 under the mandate of Donald Trump. He was then advised by John Bolton.

For months, Tehran has made any deal conditional on the removal of the Revolutionary Guards from the US blacklist of terrorist organizations.

“This is not the first time we have uncovered an Iranian plot for revenge on American soil and we will work tirelessly to unmask and prevent each and every such attempt,” Deputy Attorney General Matthew Olsen said.

According to the indictment, in late 2021, Shahram Poursafi came into contact with a person who was supposed to carry out the murder. In fact, he was an informant for the US Federal Police (FBI). For months they exchanged messages.

One million dollars in cryptocurrencies for a second goal

Shahram Poursafi instructed him to open a cryptocurrency account and then gave him the business address of Donald Trump’s former adviser. Later, he urged him to carry out the plan before the first anniversary of Qassem Soleimani’s death.

Once the January 3, 2022 date had passed, Shahram Poursafi continued to pressure the informant to kill John Bolton, promising him a million dollar contract if he could target a second target.

Bolton had supported the withdrawal of the United States from the nuclear agreement

The FBI published a wanted poster for Shahram Poursafi with multiple photos, two of which show him dressed in a Revolutionary Guards uniform. “In their exchanges, the confidential source repeatedly referred to Poursafi as linked to the Quds Force. Poursafi never denied this,” the US justice said.

If arrested, which is unlikely as he appears to be in Iran, Shahram Poursafi faces up to 25 years in prison.

National Security Advisor to Donald Trump from April 2018 to September 2019, John Bolton considered the 2015 nuclear deal a “huge strategic mistake.” He had publicly supported Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the pact, whose objective is to guarantee the civilian character of the Iranian nuclear program.

The indictment alleges that John Bolton was informed of the plot and cooperated with investigators.

Iran’s ‘serious and credible’ threats against Pompeo continue

In a statement, he called Iranian officials “liars, terrorists, and enemies of the United States,” and called on President Joe Biden not to renounce the Iran deal.

Current White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan tweeted that Tehran would face “serious consequences” if it attacked current or former US officials.

Last March, the State Department revealed to Congress that it had to pay two million dollars a month to guarantee the security of former foreign minister Mike Pompeo, in the face of “serious and credible” threats from Iran.

Along with John Bolton, Mike Pompeo was one of the main architects of the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” policy on Iran.

*With AFP; adapted from its original French version