US charges Pakistani with alleged ties to Iran in foiled assassination plot

A Pakistani man with alleged ties to Iran has been charged in the United States in connection with a foiled plot to assassinate a US politician or government officials, the Justice Department said on Tuesday.

Asif Merchant, 46, sought to recruit people in the United States to carry out the plot in retaliation for the US killing of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ top commander Qassem Soleimani in 2020, according to a criminal complaint.

Merchant, who prosecutors allege spent time in Iran before travelling to the US, was charged with murder for hire in federal court in New York’s Brooklyn borough. A federal judge ordered him detained on July 16, according to court records.

“For years, the Justice Department has been working aggressively to counter Iran’s brazen and unrelenting efforts to retaliate against American public officials for the killing of Iranian General Soleimani,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.

FBI investigators believe that former president Donald Trump, who approved the drone strike on Soleimani, and other current and former US government officials were the intended targets of the plot, CNN reported, citing a US official.

Court documents do not name the alleged targets of the plot. Merchant told a law enforcement informant that there would be “security all around” one target, according to the criminal complaint.

A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment further. Trump’s presidential campaign could not immediately be reached for comment.

A 20-year-old gunman wounded the former Republican president and current White House candidate at a July 13 campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

The gunman opened fire on Trump with an AR-style assault rifle just minutes after he began speaking at the campaign event.

Perched on the roof of a nearby building, he was shot dead by a Secret Service sniper less than 30 seconds after firing the first of eight shots.

Investigators concluded the young man, who lived in a town about 80 kilometres from Butler, acted alone and were not able to identify any strong ideological or political leanings.

Two rally attendees were seriously wounded and a 50-year-old Pennsylvania firefighter, Corey Comperatore, was shot dead.

Former US Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle admitted to Congress that she and her agency failed and subsequently resigned.

Last week, the US Secret Service’s acting director said that police in Pennsylvania had warned that there was a man with a gun on a roof before the July 13 attempted assassination but the message did not reach its agents on time.

Local authorities and Secret Service agents were using different communication channels, which prevented the warning from getting through before the assailant opened fire on the Republican presidential candidate.