US official says Iranian plot to assassinate Israel’s ambassador to Mexico has been contained with no current threat, while Iran denies the allegations.
WASHINGTON: Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps plotted to assassinate Israel’s ambassador to Mexico starting late last year, but the effort was contained and there is no current threat, a U.S. official said on Friday.
Mexico’s government said later in the day it had “no information regarding an alleged attack against the Israeli ambassador to Mexico.”
The U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the plot against the ambassador, Einat Kranz Neiger, had been active through the first half of this year.
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“The plot was contained and does not pose a current threat,” the official told Reuters.
“This is just the latest in a long history of Iran’s global lethal targeting of diplomats, journalists, dissidents, and anyone who disagrees with them, something that should deeply worry every country where there is an Iranian presence.”
The official declined to say how the plot was foiled or offer more details about the operation.
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Israel’s Foreign Ministry, in a statement, thanked the security and law enforcement services in Mexico for “thwarting a terrorist network directed by Iran that sought to attack Israel’s ambassador in Mexico.”
The Iranian Embassy in Mexico said the accusation was “entirely false,” the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.
“We will never tarnish the good reputation of Mexicans, our friends. We consider betrayal of Mexico’s interests as betrayal of our own interests, and respecting Mexico’s laws is our highest priority,” Mehr cited the embassy as saying.
The United States and its allies have frequently alleged that Iran and its proxies have sought to launch violent attacks against Tehran’s opponents.
Iranian officials have rejected the allegations, saying they are politically motivated.
Security services in Britain and Sweden warned last year that Tehran was using criminal proxies to carry out violent attacks in those countries, with London saying it had disrupted 20 Iran-linked plots since 2022.
A dozen other countries have condemned what they called a surge in assassination, kidnapping, and harassment plots by Iranian intelligence services.
Britain’s domestic spy chief, MI5 Director General Ken McCallum, said last month that Iran was “frantically” trying to silence its critics around the world, and cited how Australia had exposed Iranian involvement in antisemitic plots and Dutch authorities had revealed a failed assassination attempt.
Israel has long been an Iranian target and particularly so after the Israelis engaged in an air war with Iran that included U.S. bombers attacking Iranian nuclear sites in June. – Reuters
