Agencies/New Delhi
Indian authorities have arrested a local journalist working for an Iranian news agency in connection with last month’s Israeli embassy car bomb blast, a police official said yesterday.
Mohamed Ahmed Kazmi is taken to a court in New Delhi yesterday
It was the first arrest over the February 13 attack that Israel has blamed Iran of perpetrating. An Israeli diplomat’s wife, her driver and two others were wounded, and the blast coincided with an attack on another Israeli diplomat in Tbilisi, Georgia.
The freelance Indian journalist, Mohamed Kazmi, was arrested in a southern district of New Delhi on Tuesday evening and charged with criminal conspiracy, Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat said.
“Sayed Mohamed Ahmed Kazmi, 52, was arrested by the special cell of Delhi Police around 11.30pm on Tuesday from India Islamic Cultural Centre in south Delhi’s Lodhi Road area,” he said.
Kazmi, a native of Meerut in Uttar Pradesh, has been residing in south Delhi’s B K Dutt colony near Jor Bagh area for several years.
“Kazmi, a postgraduate in Persian language from Delhi University, has worked as a freelance journalist with DD News. For 30 years he has been working as a freelance journalist and has also been working as a news reader for a Tehran-based radio,” Bhagat said.
NDTV news channel reported that Kazmi, who was produced in a local court yesterday, had been in touch with one of the attackers. He was not directly involved in the attack itself, in which a motorcyclist attached a bomb to the car and set off the device.
A few days ago, Kazmi had visited Syria with a group of journalists, Bhagat said. The court sent Kazmi to 20 days’ police custody until March 27.
His lawyer told court that Kazmi was a senior and responsible journalist and has covered Iraq war while working with DD news. He argued that Kazmi should not be sent to 20 days’ police custody.
However, police said Kazmi had given shelter to the blast accused and helped him in doing a trial run of the area.
A small scooter, which was used during the blast, has been recovered from Kazmi’s house, said another senior police official.
The official refused to disclose more information citing the sensitivity of the case.
Last month, Israel accused arch-enemies Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah of being behind the twin bomb attacks that targeted Israeli embassy staff in India and Georgia.
They were followed a day later by three explosions in Bangkok, Thailand, one of which seriously wounded an Iranian man. Israel said that was also part of an attempted terrorist attack by Iran.
Tehran denied involvement in the attacks, which amplified tensions between two countries already at loggerheads over Iran’s nuclear programme, and accused Israel of carrying out the attacks itself.
Home Minister P Chidambaram last month said police and security agencies were “confident” of cracking the car bombing case, which came five months after a powerful blast at the Delhi High Court killed 13 people.
The arrest came ahead of a controversial four-day visit to Iran on Saturday by an Indian trade delegation which is looking to exploit opportunities created by US-led sanctions against the Islamic republic.
Pro-Israeli groups in the United States and other critics have accused India of undermining international efforts to isolate Iran over its disputed nuclear programme.