The United States believes Iran has been plotting an assassination of the US ambassador to South Africa, Lana Marks, in retaliation for the killing of top Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani in Iraq earlier this year, Politico reported on Monday, citing US intelligence reports
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th September, 2020) The United States believes Iran has been plotting an assassination of the US ambassador to South Africa, Lana Marks, in retaliation for the killing of top Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani in Iraq earlier this year, Politico reported on Monday, citing US intelligence reports.
Officials familiar with the reports told the news outlet that the US had been aware of a general threat against Marks since the spring. The ambassador was also allegedly informed about the threat.
According to the media outlet, a possible attack on the US diplomat is just one of the options to avenge Soleimani's assassination being considered by Iran, the outlet argued.
Marks was sworn in as US Ambassador to South Africa in October 2019. She has known US President Donald Trump personally for two decades. According to Politico's sources, it is the long-time friendship between Trump and Marks that might have played a role in the plotting of alleged assassination by Iran. Yet, the US intelligence is not sure as to why it was Marks who was chosen, as she has no major connections to Tehran.
The media outlet added, citing sources, that the Iranian government allegedly operated clandestine networks in South Africa.
Representatives of the US State Department and the intelligence services refused to comment on the Politico report. Iran's UN ambassador, a diplomat at the South African embassy in Washington, and the US National Security Council did not respond to the outlet's requests for comment.
On January 3, an airstrike ordered by Trump on the outskirts of Baghdad killed Soleimani, one of the most prominent military figures in Iran, and several other members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. The assassination prompted Tehran to attack US bases in Iraq. About the same day, Iranian forces, expecting a retaliatory strike from the US, mistakenly downed a Ukrainian passenger jet, which fatally crashed with 176 people on board.
