Iranian arrested on suspicion of helping 2 Argentina bombings

BUENOS AIRES, Dec. 6 (JTA) — An anti-terrorist squad here has arrested an Iranian woman on suspicion that she was involved in the bombings of the Israeli Embassy and the AMIA Jewish community center earlier this decade. Nasrim Mokhtari was arrested last Friday as she was waiting to transfer flights at the local airport. The official in charge of the still-unsolved embassy bombing, Supreme Court Legal Secretary Esteban Canevari, interrogated Mokhtari. Police sources told JTA that Mokhtari, 33, the only suspect currently under arrest for either attack, was found in possession of several passports, including an Argentine one. Rogelio Cichowolsky, legal counsel to the Argentine Jewish umbrella organization DAIA, called the arrest a “breakthrough.” “I think the investigation will become more focused, sharper, and that she will provide useful information,” he said. Federal Judge Juan Jose Galeano, who is in charge of the investigation of the AMIA bombing, reportedly suspects Mokhtari of also being involved in the March 1994 bombing, which left 86 dead and 300 wounded. The 1992 embassy bombing killed some 20 people and left 200 wounded. Suspicions that Mokhtari was one of a number of Iranians who plotted the bombings were raised by Wilson Dos Santos, who met her in Buenos Aires in early 1994. On July 8, 1994, Dos Santos warned the Argentine consulate in Milan, Italy, that “a major terrorist action” was going to be carried in Buenos Aires. No one believed him. Some 10 days later, the AMIA building was leveled by a car bomb. After he was arrested, Dos Santos told the police that Mokhtari, whom he identified as a former lover, had told him about the plan. After her arrest, Mokhtari denied having ever met Dos Santos.