(25 Oct 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Buenos Aires, Argentina – 25 October 2024
1. Argentina Security Minister Patricia Bullrich arrives for a news conference
2. Bullrich, flanked by Ricardo Ferrer Picado, right, National Criminal Intelligence Director, and Sergio Neiffert, left, State Intelligence Secretariat director
3. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Patricia Bullrich, Argentina Security Minister:
"We have come to show the brain and recruiter of Hezbollah in Latin America. What we have come to present to you is very important because this person called Hussein Ahmad Karaki has been working since the 90s in the Hezbollah organization in our continent."
4. Bullrich showing a photo of alledged Hezbollah operative Hussein Ahmad Karaki
5. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Patricia Bullrich, Argentina Security Minister:
"We want the Argentine people to know that Karaki was behind the (Israeli) embassy attack, that he was the one who bought the embassy car bomb, and that he was the operational leader in direct line with (Hassan) Nasrallah who was killed a few weeks ago in Lebanon, and that he received the direct order to attack the AMIA (Argentine Israelite Mutual Association) later as well."
6. Bullrich, left, Picado, center and Neiffert
STORYLINE:
Authorities in Argentina on Friday named the Lebanese Hussein Ahmad Karaki as the operational leader of the Hezbollah militia in Latin America and a participant in two attacks against Jewish targets in Buenos Aires. They announced that Argentina has requested his international arrest.
The Minister of Security, Patricia Bullrich, said in a press conference that Karaki, who she said is in Lebanon, was in charge of obtaining a car bomb used in the attack on the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires in 1992 and that he also he would have been involved in the blowing up of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) in the capital two years later.
The official say Karaki is considered "the brain and recruiter" of Hezbollah in Latin America and pointed out that the information resulted from an investigation coordinated with Brazil and Paraguay.
Karaki operated in Argentina under the name Alberto León Naim.
She added the official, who specified that the government had asked the justice system to request a red alert from Interpol for his capture.
Karaki would have entered Argentina in January 1992. The attack on the Israeli embassy occurred March 17th of that year.
Bullrich also pointed out the Lebanese man as allegedly responsible for several attempted attacks in countries in the region, such as Brazil, in recent years.
The attacks on the embassy and the AMIA caused more than a hundred deaths. In different rulings over the years, the Argentine justice system has considered Iran, the ideologue of the two events, and Hezbollah, its executing arm. That country has denied the accusations.
The Chamber of Criminal Cassation, Argentina’s highest criminal court, confirmed that Iran and the Lebanese group were involved in these terrorist acts.
AP Video by Victor R. Caivano
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