FBI releases new images of Iran intel officers allegedly involved in Robert Levinson abduction
Each attached to a seeking information poster, the images of Reza Amiri Moghadam, Taghi Daneshvar and Gholamhossein Mohammadnia are part of an extensive investigation into Levinson's disappearance in 2007, the FBI's Washington field office said.
Moghadam is the current Iranian ambassador to Pakistan and previously led the operations unit of the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security in Tehran, an agency whose members the FBI has accused of helping orchestrate Levinson's abduction.
Daneshvar is described by the FBI as a high-ranking officer in the Iranian intelligence ministry involved in counterespionage activities. Around the time Levinson disappeared, he allegedly oversaw the work of Mohammad Baseri, another Iranian intelligence officer whom the United States government has accused in the abduction.
Mohammadnia is a senior deputy in the intelligence ministry who served as the Iranian ambassador to Albania in 2016, before being expelled from Albania two years later for "damaging its national security," according to the FBI. The U.S. agency said Mohammadnia led an initiative to blame Levinson's disappearance "on a terrorist group in Pakistan's Baluchistan region to shift blame away from the Iranian government."
"These three intelligence officers were among those who allegedly facilitated Bob's 2007 abduction and the subsequent cover-up by the Iranian government. Bob likely later perished in captivity far away from his family, friends, and colleagues," said Steven Jenson, the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Washington office, in a statement. "The FBI will continue its relentless pursuit to hold anyone involved in his abduction to account for their reprehensible actions."
The U.S. has maintained a view since Levinson vanished that the retired agent was kidnapped during an unauthorized CIA mission in Iran, and subsequently detained wrongfully by the Iranian government. Levinson was believed to be alive for years, until U.S. officials in 2020 said intelligence indicated he may actually have been dead "for some time."
Moghadam, Daneshvar and Mohammadnia were sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in March for allegedly playing a role in Levinson's "abduction, probable death, and Iran's efforts to cover up or obfuscate their responsibility," the federal agency said in an announcement at the time.
The latest seeking information posters followed two others released by the FBI in December, for Baseri and Ahmad Khazai, both Iranian senior intelligence officers thought to be responsible for Levinson's abduction, detention and probable death. Federal authorities have described the men as high-ranking officers in the Iranian intelligence ministry. Both also were sanctioned by the U.S. government.
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