Iran President Rouhani accuses Israel of assassinating its top scientist

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has accused Israel of masterminding the assassination of its top-ranking nuclear physicist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, who was murdered on Friday, Al Jazeerah reports.

In a national broadcast on Saturday, Rouhani said the “assassination of the 63-year-old Fakhrizadeh shows our enemies’ despair and the depth of their hatred.”

“Once again, the evil hands of global arrogance were stained with the blood of the mercenary usurper Zionist regime,” Rouhani added.

Iranian media reports that Fakharizadeh died in hospital after attackers gunned him down in his car in Ab-Sard, a suburb in eastern Tehran

Until his assassination, Fakhrizadeh had been a member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and was an expert in missile production. He was also head of the Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research of the Defence Ministry at the time of his death.

A military adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Commander Hossein Dehghan, in a tweet, also accused Israel of killing Fakhrizadeh to “try to provoke a war.”

“In the last days of the political life of their ally, US President Donald Trump, the Zionists (Israel) seek to intensify pressure on Iran and create a full-blown war,” Dehghan tweeted.

Read also: Soleimani’s heroics saved Europe from danger – Rouhani

The death of Fakhrizadeh, according to security experts, could provoke a confrontation between Iran and its rivals in the last weeks of Donald Trump’s US presidency, while complicating any effort by President-elect Joe Biden to revive diplomacy with Iran.

The scientist’s killing came amid fresh concerns about the amount of enriched uranium Iran is producing, which is a key component for both nuclear power generation and nuclear weapons.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, while reacting to the murder of the scientist, said there was evidence pointing to the involvement of Israel in the assassination, but it was unclear who exactly conducted the hit.

Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Majid Takht Ravanchi, wrote in a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the UN Security Council on Friday, that several top Iranian scientists had been killed in “terrorist attacks” over the last decade, and said “certain foreign quarters” were responsible.

He called the “cowardly” assassination of Fakhrizadeh an attempt to “wreak havoc” on the region and disrupt Iran’s development in the fields of science and technology.

The report added that Iranian officials are already vowing to respond while saying their nuclear program will continue as the killing of Fakhrizadeh will also raise questions about the country’s internal security.

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