WASHINGTON - A man who said he coordinated most of Iran's terror operations of the last decade claimed responsibility for two major attacks on the United States, the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 and the Khobar Towers bombing, "60 Minutes" reported Sunday.

The man, whom the CBS News program identified as Ahmad Behbahani, told a "60 Minutes" journalist that he proposed the 1988 Pan Am operation, brought on board a radical Palestinian terrorist living in Syria, then imported and trained Libyan operatives to do the job.

On the 1996 truck bombing of Khobar Towers, a barracks for U.S. airmen in Saudi Arabia in which 19 Air Force personnel died, the man spoke of evidence that Iran masterminded the attack.

Iranian-born associate producer Roya Hakakian, who met the man inside a refugee camp in Turkey, said Behbahani "referred to himself as `we,' and it was very clear ... that he was the person who oversaw and coordinated these activities."

Because of tight Turkish security -- Behbahani said it was because Turkish officials feared Iranian agents wanted to kill him -- the interview was not recorded, the program said.

"You could very well be (an assassin)," Hakakian said Behbahani told her. "I personally posed as a reporter when I killed Mr. Ghassemlou in Vienna."

Abdul-Rahman Ghassemlou was shot to death with two colleagues in July 1989 while attending secret peace talks with the Iranian government in the Austrian capital.

On May 24, the Washington office of the dissident National Council of Resistance of Iran circulated a news release reporting that Ahmad Beladi-Behbahani, Iran's deputy minister for counterintelligence, had entered Turkey and urged the Turkish government to arrest him.

The council blamed the deputy minister for murders of many dissidents in Europe and elsewhere and said he "had detailed information about the Lockerbie bombing."

"60 Minutes" said the Central Intelligence Agency in Washington at first said it had never heard of Behbahani. After contacting British intelligence, the program said, the CIA confirmed that a man named Ahmad Behbahani orchestrated Iranian terrorism.
 

Futile Ploy by Clerical Regime in Face of Recent Revelations, Agence France Presse, June 5

NICOSIA - Iran's main armed opposition group Monday strongly denied Tehran's claims that an Iranian defector who told a US television channel Iran was behind the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, was one of its members.

The People's Mojahedin described the claim about Ahmad Behbahani made in the conservative Tehran Times as "false and ridiculous."

The… [National Council of Resistance of Iran's] statement said Behbahani, far from being a member of the [Mojahedin] organization, had been "active in the suppression and killing of Mujahedeen members and supporters in the past two decades."

It also said Behbahani, whom it described as a deputy intelligence minister, had been "involved in many terrorist operations abroad," including the Lockerbie bombing.

In a statement issued May 24, the Mojahedin announced Behbahani's defection to Turkey and said he had "detailed information" about the Lockerbie bombing.
 

NEWS BITES

Agence France Presse, June 5 - Turkish intelligence services announced Monday that an Iranian ex-intelligence agent had sought asylum in Turkey and asked to be allowed to go to the United States. The announcement followed news that Iran's deputy foreign minister had arrived for a surprise visit amid tensions between the two countries.

Agence France Presse, June 5 - A report blaming Iran and not Libya for the 1988 Pan Am bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, was "interesting," US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said Sunday.

Agence France Presse, June 5 - An upsurge in tension between Iran and Turkey has cast doubt on the participation of Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer at the summit of the 10-member Economic Cooperation Organization, which opens here [in Tehran] Saturday, said a source close to the organization on Monday. 

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