US busts Iran plot to murder Saudi ambassador

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WASHINGTON, Oct 12 (AFP): Tensions ran high Wednesday after the United States said it had foiled a high-level Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi envoy to Washington and warned it would hold Tehran accountable. In an explosive twist to the bitter showdown with the Islamic Republic, the Justice Department Tuesday charged two men with conspiring with Iranian government factions to blow up Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir on US soil. The New York Times cited an unnamed law enforcement official as saying the plot also included plans to pay a notorious Mexican drug cartel to bomb the Israeli embassy in Washington and the Israeli and Saudi embassies in Argentina. US Attorney General Eric Holder said the "conspiracy was conceived, sponsored and directed from Iran and constitutes a flagrant violation of US and international law." "In addition to holding these individual conspirators accountable for their alleged role in this plot, the United States is committed to holding Iran accountable for its actions." A criminal complaint named Manssor Arbabsiar, 56, a naturalised US citizen holding Iranian and US passports, and Gholam Shakuri, an Iran-based member of the Quds Force, a unit of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Shakuri remains at large while Arbabsiar was arrested on September 29 at New York's John F. Kennedy airport and appeared in court Tuesday in Manhattan. His lawyer said he would plead not guilty, if charged. The alleged attempt, dubbed a "Hollywood" scenario by one top US official, was broken open by a paid US source posing as a member of a "violent" Mexico-based drug cartel known for "numerous" assassinations and murders. The defendants believed the cartel would provide explosives for an attack on the ambassador, according to the complaint.