04 October 2013

Iran for the day

JohnThomas Didymus has an AllVoices article about an assassination (maybe) in Iran:
The commander of Iran's cyberwarfare program, Mojtaba Ahmadi, was shot dead in a killing suspected to be part of a series of assassinations targeting key members of the country's security system. However, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has issued a statement, saying they are still investigating the "horrific incident."
The statement quoted by Iran's military news, Sepah, under the title Denial of news reports of the assassination of one of IRGC's officials, said: "In the wake of a horrific incident involving one of the IRGC officials... the matter is being investigated and the main reason of the event and the motive of the attacker has not been specified."
An official source also said: "The result of investigation will be announced through official channels and any speculation will not be appropriate before the investigation is over."
A Facebook page for officers of the Cyber War Headquarters, however, confirmed the killing of the commander, expressing condolences.
The Telegraph also quoted a local police chief saying the killing was an assassination.
According to Iranian website Alborz, Ahmadi, whose Cyber War Headquarters is a unit of Iran's elite IRGC  was last seen leaving his home in Tehran for work. His dead body was recovered with two bullet holes a few hours later in a wooded area in the town of Karaj to the northwest of Tehran.
An eyewitness reportedly told Alborz: “I could see two bullet wounds on his body and the extent of his injuries indicated that he had been assassinated from a close range with a pistol."
A local police commander said two men on motorcycles were involved in the suspected assassination. Users of the website Alborz said to have close links with the IRGC warned that an open condolence book on Facebook could put national security at risk.
A message by one user warned: "Stop giving more information about him. The counter-revolutionaries will take advantage of his murder. It sounds like a hit job for a security officer of this importance.”
There have been a series of assassinations targeting top Iranian officials and nuclear scientists in recent times. Since 2007, five nuclear scientists and the head of the country's ballistic missile program have been killed.
Iranian authorities have accused Israel's Mossad of carrying out the assassinations.
During his recent address to the United Nations General Assembly, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani spoke about assassinations targeting "common people and political figures in Iran", and demanded that the UN Security Council investigate the matter.
The most recent, in January of 2012, involved a scientist at the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz. He was killed in an explosion by a device planted inside his car.
However, there has also been speculation that some of the murders could have been fallout of internal wrangling being conveniently blamed on outside forces.
Although Iran has been accused of involvement in cyberattacks against the West, it has also been the target of what is widely believed to be US attacks. One of the attacks, involving a virus called Stuxnet, targeted computer systems in one of the country's nuclear facilities.
Rico says that he didn't do it, but the suspect list is long... (And the IRGC has a Facebook page? How hip.)

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