Iranian state news sites are exploding today with the news that Jondallah leader, Abdol-Malek Rigi, has been arrested in Iran. Some of the reports, however, are conflicting. IRNA claimed that Rigi was flying over Iran en route from Pakistan to an unspecified Arab country when his plane was forced to land in Iran by state authorities. Iran's English language Press TV describes a similar scenario; however, this time Rigi is said to have been captured while flying from Dubai to Kyrgyzstan and was apparently transfered to Iran from somewhere outside of the country. Fars News has provided pictures (see above) and video of the arrest. Fars News also claims that Rigi had met with Americans in Afghanistan the day prior to his arrest. Al-Jazeera (according to an OSC translation) claims that Rigi was arrested by Pakistani officials and transfered to Iran last week. It'll be interesting to see what the official story is in another day or two. Jondallah published a response to Rigi's arrest in which they blame a host of intelligence agencies (western countries, Afghanistan, and Pakistan) for working in collusion with the Iranians. Here's an additional photo of Rigi's arrest from Press TV (it sure looks like him):
Another photo of Rigi on an airplane after his arrest (courtesy: Tabnak):
0 comments:
Post a Comment