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The US Department of Justice on Friday (local time) charged a man who was allegedly tasked by Iran to assassinate US President-elect Donald Trump during his campaign, a US Department of Justice statement said.
The charges say that an agent with Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, a designated terrorist organisation by the US, had instructed an Afghan citizen, Farhad Shakeri (51), to come up with the plan in October. "There are few actors in the world that pose as grave a threat to the national security of the United States as Iran," Attorney General Merrick B Garland said. Garland said the Justice Department "has charged an asset of the Iranian regime who was tasked by the regime to direct a network of criminal associates to further Iran's assassination plots against its targets, including President-elect Donald Trump". The alleged assassination attempt revealed a wider spectrum where New York City residents Carlisel Rivera (49) and Jonathon Lodholt (36) along with Shakeri plotted to murder a US-based journalist who was a vocal critic of Iran. While Shakeri is residing in Iran, Rivera and Lodholt stalked the journalist and updated him for months. "The charges announced today expose Iran's continued brazen attempts to target US citizens, including President-elect Donald Trump, other government leaders and dissidents who criticize the regime in Tehran," said FBI Director Christopher Wray. "Actors directed by the Government of Iran continue to target our citizens, including President-elect Trump, on US soil and abroad. This has to stop," US Attorney Damian Williams for the Southern District of New York said. As per the statement, Iran targets US and its allies in a bid to avenge the death of then-Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Qods Force (IRGC-QF), Qasem Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020. Shakeri is an IRGC asset who immigrated to the United States as a child and was deported in or about 2008 after serving 14 years in prison for a robbery conviction. In recent months, Shakeri has used a network of criminal associates he met in prison in the United States to supply the IRGC with operatives to conduct surveillance and assassinations of IRGC targets, the statement said. Ahead of the 2024 US presidential elections, a reported gunfire incident disrupted former President Donald Trump's rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, CBS News reported. Following the incident, Trump was immediately escorted off stage by US Secret Service agents. (ANI)
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