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TEHRAN - Attackers tried to kill a powerful Iranian official today, adding to an atmosphere of unease at a time of growing tension between Iran and neighboring Afghanistan.
The official, Mohsen Rafigdoust, was reported by the Government press agencies to have been unhurt in the attack, which was carried out by assailants who opened fire from hills overlooking his office.
The attempt on his life was the latest in a series of attacks on prominent Iranians, including the assassination last month of the former prison director, Assadollah Lajevardi….
There appeared to be no evidence of any link between the attempted assassination of Mr. Rafiqdoust, who heads a vast Government-affiliated economic foundation, and the Iran's increasing tensions with Afghanistan. Still, the latest attack may well be cited by some hard-liners here as further reason for Iran to confront the militant Taliban movement that controls Afghanistan….
Mr. Rafiqdoust, the official who escaped assassination today, is a leading conservative member of Iran's political establishment. Appointed to his position by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, he heads the foundation of the Deprived and war Disabled, which controls most hotels and hundreds of other enterprises. Set up after the Islamic revolution of 1979, the foundation has assets estimated in the many billions of dollars.
[The Mojahedin's Command Headquarters inside Iran issued a statement, noting that "Mohsen Rafiqdoost escaped punishment for his two decades of crimes against the Iranian people," provided some of Rafiqdoost's record as follows:
"Rafiqdoost has always been one of most senior military, security and economic figures and a special confidant of Khomeini, Khamenei and Rafsanjani in the past 19 years.
"Rafiqdoost was one the founders of the Revolutionary Guards Corps in March 1979.
"Rafiqdoost has throughout the mullahs' reign played an active role in terrorist operations and hostage taking. He declared in July 1987: "Both the TNT and the ideology which in one blast sent to hell 400 officers, NCOs, and soldiers at the Marine Headquarters have been provided by Iran" (quoted Ressalat, July 20, 1987).
In 1986, Rafiqdoost, along with Khamenei, then President, and Rafsanjani, then Majlis Speaker, and Velayati, then Foreign Minister, took part in planning the wave of assassinations and explosions in Paris which left many innocent people dead or injured.
Through revenues of companies affiliated with the Mostaz'afin Foundation in foreign countries, Rafiqdoost provides the expenditures for the regime's terrorist and fundamentalist activities, amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars.
One of the main tasks of Rafiqdoost in the Mostaz'afin Foundation, is to smuggle the regime's needed military hardware, especially proscribed weaponry, such as chemical and biological arms components as well as spare parts for warplanes.
Khamenei Threatens to Inflict Major Regional Conflict, Reuter, September 14
TEHRAN - Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned the Afghan Taleban movement and Pakistan on Monday that their actions in Afghanistan could provoke a major regional conflict.
"I have...so far prevented the lighting of a fire in this region which would be hard to extinguish. But all should know that a very great and wide danger is quite near," Khamenei said in a statement read on Tehran radio.
Shi'ite Moslem Iran has built up its forces on the Afghan border to around 70,000 in a face-off with the Sunni Taleban.
Tehran has said more than 200,000 other troops would soon hold war games along the tense border.
Iran's army said on Monday it was ready "to implement the leader's orders and to conduct any missions anywhere and under any circumstances," Iran's official news agency IRNA reported.
Khamenei warned of a religious war spreading in the region and called on the Pakistani people to stop what he said was interference in Afghanistan by "segments of Pakistan's army."
"Do not allow American oil companies to reach their mean interests in Afghanistan and Central Asia at the cost of the blood of tens of thousands of Moslems," Khamenei added.
"The Iranian nation...is impatiently waiting for decisions by state officials with a heart full of pain and anger," Khamenei said.
"Any military situation is a good way to cover up economic problems at home," said an analyst, who asked to remain anonymous.s.com