Former Iranian president blamed for 1994 Argentina bombing

Argentine federal prosecutors have called for international arrest orders against former Iranian president Hashemi Rafsanjani and 20 high-ranking officials including two of his ministers, for the 1994 bombing in the South American country.

Prosecutor Alberto Nisman asked Federal Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral on Wednesday to order the arrest of Rafsanjani, former Foreign Minister Ali Ar Velayati, former intelligence chief Ali Fallahijan, and 18 other former Iranian high officials.

Iran's government has long denied any involvement in the attack following repeated accusations by Argentina.

On July 18, 1994, a Jewish cultural center in Buenos Aires was attacked and reduced to ruins by a suicide bomber. Eighty-five people were killed and 151 were injured in the worst terrorist attack ever on Argentine soil.

The decision to attack the Jewish center "was undertaken in 1993 by the highest authorities of the then-government of Iran," Nisman told a news conference on Wednesday.

Rafsanjani was Iran's president between 1989 and 1997.

A report, presented to Federal Judge Corral on Wednesday by Nisman and his fellow prosecutors, suggested that evidence shows the attack was initiated by the Lebanon-based group Hezbollah, and funded by the Iranian embassy in Argentina, which also served as an intelligence gathering station.

Some Iranian agents sneaked into Argentina on July 1, 1994, and left before the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber, the report said.

Hussein Berro, a Lebanese Hezbollah militant, was the suicide bomber who drove a vehicle laden with explosives into the seven-story Jewish center, according to the report.

Source: Xinhua