Larijani blames Israel, US for death of Iran physicist
Iranian parliament speaker calls drive-by shooting a "terrorist US-Israeli action which targeted one of the elites of Iran."
By REUTERSLarijani 311(photo credit: Munich Security conference)
TEHRAN - A senior Iranian official on Sunday blamed the United States and Israel for the assassination of an Iranian scientist, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.Darioush Rezaie, 35, a university lecturer with a physics doctorate, was shot dead by a motorcyclist in Tehran on Saturday. The student news agency ISNA quoted an unnamed police official as saying Rezaie was a nuclear scientist but Deputy Interior Minister Safarali Baratlou said this was not certain.RELATED:'Iran globally recruiting scientists for nuclear program'"The terrorist US-Israeli action yesterday, which targeted one of the country's scientific elites, is another example of the level of the US animosity (against Iran), said parliament speaker Ali Larijani in a speech to the legislative body.Iran's security apparatus is investigating the assassination, but no arrests have been reported.Larijani also blamed "American adventurism" for the deaths on Friday of a senior commander of the elite Revolutionary Guards corps and five others in a landmine explosion on a road."The Americans who regard such measures in their so-called world management as permissible should think well about the consequences," Larijani said.There has been no claim of responsibility for Rezaie's killing. Several nuclear scientists have been assassinated in Iran in the last few years. One scientist was killed and another wounded in Tehran in November.
