News agencies are reporting a terrorist plot to kill Russian president Vladimir Putin during his visit this week to Tehran. DEBKAfile has some details about the plot that I haven't seen elsewhere:
Vladimir Putin has decided not to accept his security services' advice to call off his trip Tuesday, Oct. 16 to attend the Caspian Sea summit and meet President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Its cancellation would damage Russian-Iranian relations.
Iran's foreign ministry dismissed the reports as "completely baseless and part of a psychological war to disrupt Russian-Iranian ties."
DEBKAfile's intelligence sources report that the assassination plot, hatched by three gangs which joined hands ad hoc, was betrayed to the Russians by a Chechen who was detained before he managed to slip into Iran and join the conspirators.
The three groups are: Chechen separatists, whose revolt is almost completely crushed in Russia; an al Qaeda-Taliban group bidding to settle scores with Putin for his denial of Muslim rights in Kosovo; and an ultra-extremist wing of the clerical regime, which accuses Russia of selling out Iranian interests as an American vassal.
Putin aroused their ire by his "treacherous" offer to transfer Iran's uranium enrichment program to Russia, his calculated foot-dragging on the delivery of fuel for the Bushehr reactor and delays in completing its construction. Moscow moreover is held accountable for voting twice with the United States on UN Security Council sanctions against Iran.
The cancellation of his trip would "damage Russian/Iranian relations," according to the above report. Does this imply that his murder would be less damaging to relations than cancelling the trip?
RLC
