Denmark says Iran planned assassination

COPENHAGEN: Denmark said yesterday it suspected an Iranian Government intelligence service had tried to carry out a plot to assassinate an Iranian Arab opposition figure on its soil.

The alleged plot, which Denmark’s foreign minister said he believed the Iranian Government was behind, prompted the Nordic country to call for fresh European Unionwide sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

A Norwegian citizen of Iranian background was arrested in Sweden on October 21 in connection with the plot and extradited to Denmark, Swedish security police said.

The Norwegian has denied the charges and the Iranian Government has denied any connection with the alleged plot.

The attack was meant to target the leader of the Danish branch of the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz (ASMLA), Danish intelligence chief Finn Borch Andersen said.

ASMLA seeks a separate state for ethnic Arabs in Iran’s oil producing southwestern province of Khuzestan. Arabs are a minority in Iran, and some see themselves as under Persian occupation and want independence or autonomy.

‘‘We are dealing with an Iranian intelligence agency planning an attack on Danish soil. Obviously, we can’t and won’t accept that,’’ Andersen told a news conference.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi dismissed the accusations. ‘‘This is a continuation of enemies’ plots to damage Iranian relations with Europe at this critical time,’’ Tasnim news agency quoted him as saying.

The EU is trying to save big powers’ 2015 deal with Iran that curbed its nuclear activity in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions after the United States withdrew from the pact and reimposed farreaching financial penalties on Teheran.

Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen called the planned attack ‘‘totally unacceptable’’. — Reuters