A man armed with a Kalashnikov was arrested last week in New York outside the home of an Iranian-American feminist journalist and activist, hostile to Tehran and the target of a kidnapping project in 2018.
Published: August 2, 2022 at 9:13 p.m.
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Last Wednesday and Thursday, Khalid Mehdiyev was caught around Masih Alinejad’s home in Brooklyn, one of New York’s five boroughs. The man was finally arrested at the end of last week by the FBI who discovered in his car an AK-47 rifle and about sixty ammunition, according to a note from the federal police filed with the Manhattan federal court.
In these court documents made public over the weekend, Masih Alinejad is not cited, but the person concerned confirmed on Twitter on Sunday and Monday, with video surveillance images in support, that the man arrested by the police New Yorker “had attempted to return to (her) home in New York with a loaded gun to kill (her)”.
“Last year, the FBI prevented the Islamic Republic (of Iran) from kidnapping me. My crime is to give a voice to the voiceless. The United States government must be tough on terrorism,” wrote the feminist activist on social networks.
Journalist threatened
In July 2021, American justice had charged four “Iranian intelligence agents”, accused of having prepared the kidnapping of Masih Alinejad in 2018 by trying to force Iranian relatives of the journalist to lure her to a third country, so that she would be arrested, taken to Iran and imprisoned.
Last summer, as a sign of support, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with this Iranian-American activist, known in particular for her positions against the wearing of the hijab by women in Iran and her hostile statements and writings. to the Tehran regime.
In New York, the American association United Against Nuclear Iran welcomed this new arrest on Monday and warned through its president, former ambassador Mark Wallace, that the “Americans will never allow elements of a hostile power to threaten to carry out attacks on United States soil.”
More diplomatic relations
Iran and the United States have not had diplomatic relations since 1980 following the Islamic Revolution the previous year.
In the 2010s, the timid warming between the two countries, thanks to the international agreement on the Iranian nuclear program concluded in July 2015, had been undermined by the American withdrawal from this text in 2018, under the presidency of Donald Trump. , and by the resumption by Tehran of uranium enrichment.
Negotiations to revive this agreement were relaunched in April 2021 but have been stalled since last March.
However, this Monday, Iranian diplomacy said it was “optimistic” about a resumption of these discussions following a draft compromise presented by the European Union and welcomed, also on Monday at the UN, by Antony Blinken .
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Arrest Kidnapping Diplomacy Tehran United States Iran New York Donald Trump United Nations European Union
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