Good news in the war on terror

….but don’t expect Nick Cohen, Melanie Phillips or Mike Blogger to write about it.

Tehran has said that it had captured the leader of a sectarian terror group with alleged links to Western intelligence services - that says it has killed dozens of Iranian civilians and officials over the past few years.

Iranian Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar told a news conference that Abdolmalek Rigi, chief of the Jundallah Sunni islamist group, had been arrested outside the country as he was "preparing for a new act of sabotage."

After his capture, Mr Rigi was brought to Iran.

Iran's intelligence minister Heidar Moslehi claimed that US officials had provided Mr Rigi with an Afghan passport and that he had had contacts with the CIA and Mossad - and had met a Nato military official in Afghanistan in April 2008.
Mr Moslehi said that Iran "reserved the right to sue the US and UK" on the basis that they co-ordinated Mr Rigi's terror attacks in Iran.

Jundallah has claimed responsibility for numerous attacks in Iran.

According to Iranian state media, the group has "carried out mass murder, armed robbery, kidnapping, acts of sabotage and bombings" targeting "civilians and government officials, as well as all ranks of Iran's military."

In the group's latest attack on October 18 last year, more than 40 people - including tribal elders and 15 members of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards - were killed in a Jundallah attack in Pishin.

In July 2008 respected US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh alleged that US congressional leaders had secretly agreed to former president George W Bush's $400m (£260m) funding request for a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, aimed at destabilising its leadership by "working with opposition groups and passing money."

From: The Morning Star.