Sources identify Iran diplomat arrested on suspicion of plotting attack in Paris

A source has said German authorities identified and arrested Asdollah Assadi, an Iranian diplomat currently being detained on suspicion of involvement in plotting a major bomb attack targeting an Iranian opposition gathering in Paris.

In a related case, two suspects in Belgium were intercepted by Belgian police on Saturday, with 500 grams of TATP, a home-made explosive produced from easily available chemicals, as well as a detonation device found in their car, a joint statement by the Belgian prosecutor and the intelligence services said.

Three other arrests were made in France.

“The terrorist diplomat, who is the station chief of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) in Vienna, has been stationed in Austria since August 2014,” a source from the Committee of Security and Counter-terrorism of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said in a statement sent to Al Arabiya English.

The exiled Iranian opposition group NCRI were hosting their annual Free Iran conference in France attended by US President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani and several former European and Arab ministers.

“Prior to Asadollah Assadi, an individual by the name of Mostafa Roudaki was the MOIS station chief in the regime’s embassy in Austria. Roudaki was transferred to Tehran and was subsequently dispatched to Albania in 2017 as the MOIS station chief there to plot against the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran,” the source added.