By Abimbola Ogunnaike
The ringleader of United States (US) based terror group, Jamshid Sharmahd,accused of committing terror attacks and counterrevolutionary operations against the Islamic Republic of Iran has been sentenced to death on Tuesday, 21 February, 2023, by a Revolutionary Court in Tehran, the country’s capital.
Judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported that Sharmahd bagged death penalty on charges of “corruption on earth” by planning and orchestrating terrorist acts in the country.
The convict, who holds German citizenship and is also a US resident, was the ringleader of the Tondar (Thunder) terrorist outfit. He was accused of planning a series of attacks, including a 2008 attack against a religious congregation center in the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, Fars Province, which killed 14 people and wounded hundreds.
Aside this, Sharmahd and his Tondar group were also said to be behind a 2010 terrorist bombing at Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s mausoleum in the Iranian capital, which left several people injured.
The 67-year-old is also accused of working with US intelligence and spying on Iran’s ballistic missile program.
Citing documents in the case, Mizan news agency said Sharmahd had planned to commit 23 terrorist acts, and succeeded in executing five. “His verdict can still be appealed in the Supreme Court,” Mizan added.
The Iranian Intelligence Ministry announced in a statement in August 2020 that it had arrested the terrorist ringleader, who had directed “armed operations and acts of sabotage” in Iran from the US.
After his arrest, Sharmahd admitted to providing explosives for the bombing attack in the Hosseynieh Seyed al-Shohada Mosque in Shiraz, in which 14 people were killed and more than 200 wounded.
According to the Ministry, the group had planned to carry out several high-profile and potentially deadly attacks across the Islamic Republic, but its efforts were aborted by the intelligence operations targeting the outfit.
