Argentina designated the Iranian proxy organization Hezbollah an “Entity Tied to Acts of Terrorism” this week in anticipation of the anniversary of the 1994 bombing of the Argentine-Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) headquarters Thursday, at its time the deadliest terrorist attack in the modern history of the Western Hemisphere.

The 1994 AMIA bombing – the second against an Israeli target in Argentina in as many years, believed to have been orchestrated by the same actors tied to the Iranian regime – remains the second-deadliest attack in the hemisphere’s history after the al-Qaeda attacks on September 11, 2001, killing 85 people between five and 73 years old.

Argentina’s Financial Information Unit (UIF) added Hezbollah to its Public Registry of Persons and Entities Tied to Acts of Terrorism on Wednesday, which freezes the organization’s assets and any assets that Hezbollah’s leaders may have stashed in the country. UIF chief Mariano Federici called Hezbollah “a current and active threat” to the Argentine homeland.

Argentina’s Public Registry of Persons and Entities Tied to Acts of Terrorism was only one day old when the UIF added Hezbollah to it. Macri created it on Tuesday to help the Ministry of Justice more easily keep funds out of terrorists’ hands. Buenos Aires’ announcement of the new registry also stated it would “allow access to and exchanges over information on people and entities tied to acts of terrorism and/or their financing and facilitate domestic and international cooperation to prevent, combat, and eradicate terrorism and its financing.”

Macri led an observance ceremony on Thursday for the victims of the AMIA attack, calling for those responsible to “be judged on Argentine soil,” for Interpol not to withdraw its red alerts, and “for no other country to give them diplomatic immunity,” which some of the suspects have received from Iran. In reporting on the new Hezbollah terrorist designation, Iranian’s state-run PressTV once again refuted any involvement in the attack, calling Argentina’s evidence “trumped-up charges.”

“Argentina accuses the Lebanese movement of carrying out the bombing, an allegation that Hezbollah describes as ‘categorically false,'” PressTV noted. “However, Buenos Aires has so far failed to provide substantial evidence and prove that Hezbollah was behind the attack.”

Through the work of Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman, authorities in Buenos Aires identified multiple Hezbollah and Iranian government officials as the culprits of the attack, successfully securing six Interpol red notices in 2007, which advise governments to arrest the men if they enter their respective territories. Nisman was found dead with a gunshot wound in his head in January 2015, the night before he was scheduled to present to the Argentine Congress a 300-page report accusing then-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of protecting the AMIA culprits in exchange for favorable trade deals with Iran.

Police have not arrested, or even identified, anyone tied to Nisman’s death. In the immediate aftermath of his shooting, Fernández’s top prosecutor ruled the death a “suicide,” triggering widespread national protests against the socialists in power.

This week, the Argentine newspaper Clarín revealed that, according to intelligence documents, many of the same Hezbollah members and Iranian agents tied to the 1992 bombing of the Israeli embassy in Argentina also participated in the AMIA bombing, taking advantage of lax border security measures in the South American country to smuggle explosives into the capital.

“All of the Hezbollah jihadist activists and logistics operatives left the country after that terrorist attack,” Clarín noted. “And they returned. The same ones. … the bombs were different but manufactured by the same person.”

The newspaper identifies Hezbollah bombmaker Malek Obeid as the “engineer” behind the attacks. According to Nisman’s investigations, Hezbollah targeted Argentina because Buenos Aires failed to deliver on an agreement to sell nuclear weapons materials to Tehran.

Current President Mauricio Macri, a conservative, won the 2015 election largely on his promise to bring both the AMIA terrorists and Nisman’s killers to justice. His first act as president was to cancel a “memorandum of understanding” with Iran that Fernández had signed limiting investigations on the AMIA bombing.

The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has offered Macri its full backing in bringing Iran to justice. In a statement honoring the victims of the AMIA bombing, the U.S. Department of State categorically described the attack as being “perpetrated by Hizballah at the direction of the Iranian regime” and said it “targeted the Jewish community and affected all those who support democratic values.”

“We remind the world that, while Argentine authorities continue their work to bring the perpetrators of these attacks to justice, the Iranian regime has yet to cooperate fully with them,” State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus said in a statement, adding that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo would attend an anti-terror event in Buenos Aires this weekend.

In Congress, Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ben Cardin (D-MD) sent a letter Thursday to Attorney General William Barr urging the Department of Justice to do more to enforce the Interpol red alerts against the suspected AMIA jihadists.

“While the red notices remain valid, however, INTERPOL member states have not acted on them with sufficient urgency for the previous 12 years,” the senators wrote. “Despite international recognition that these Iranian officials were the masterminds of the AMIA bombing, they continue to hold positions of responsibility in the Iranian government, engaging in or supporting troubling malign activity worldwide.”

“We therefore urge the Department of Justice to support Argentina each time one of the implicated Iranian individuals in question travels outside of Iran. This is an important action that the U.S. can take to ensure Iran is not able to engage in terrorism with impunity, even 25 years after an attack,” the senators wrote. </s> Argentina has asked Russia to arrest former Iranian foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati for extradition in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires, the foreign ministry said Thursday.

Velayati is in Russia as a special advisor to President Hassan Rouhani and will travel to China on Friday, so the same request has also been made to Chinese authorities, the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Argentina is awaiting a response from Russia to the request, which was made "within the framework of the extradition treaty between the two countries," the statement said.

Velayati was foreign minister when a bomb destroyed the headquarters of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) on July 18, 1994 leaving 85 dead and 300 people wounded.

He is charged with "committing the crime of homicide, classified as doubly aggravated for having been committed with racial or religious hatred and a suitable method to cause widespread danger," according to the judge responsible for the case.

Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah group is accused of the carrying out the bombing of the Jewish center and an attack on Israel's embassy in Buenos Aires two years earlier at Iran's demand. </s> BUENOS AIRES, July 13 — Argentina has asked Russia to arrest former Iranian foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati for extradition in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires, the foreign ministry said yesterday.

Velayati is in Russia as a special advisor to President Hassan Rouhani and will travel to China today, so the same request has also been made to Chinese authorities, the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Argentina is awaiting a response from Russia to the request, which was made “within the framework of the extradition treaty between the two countries,” the statement said.

Velayati was foreign minister when a bomb destroyed the headquarters of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) on July 18, 1994 leaving 85 dead and 300 people wounded.

He is charged with “committing the crime of homicide, classified as doubly aggravated for having been committed with racial or religious hatred and a suitable method to cause widespread danger,” according to the judge responsible for the case.

Lebanon’s Shiah Hezbollah group is accused of the carrying out the bombing of the Jewish center and an attack on Israel’s embassy in Buenos Aires two years earlier at Iran’s demand. — AFP </s> Argentina's Foreign Ministry says it has asked Russia to arrest and extradite former Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati, citing his alleged role in a 1994 bombing in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people.

Velayati, who is now a top aide to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was visiting Moscow on July 12 for a meeting with President Vladimir Putin, but planned to travel to China on July 13.

Argentina's ministry said in a statement that it had made the same extradition request to China and was awaiting Russia's response to its request, which it said was made "within the framework of the extradition treaty between the two countries."

Velayati was foreign minister when a bomb destroyed the headquarters of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association on July 18, 1994, leaving 85 people dead and 300 wounded. It was the biggest terrorist attack in Argentina's history.

Argentine prosecutors have described Velayati as one of the "ideological masterminds behind the attack," which targeted Argentina's Jewish population of 300,000.

Velayati is charged in Argentina with "committing the crime of homicide, classified as doubly aggravated for having been committed with racial or religious hatred and a suitable method to cause widespread danger," according to the judge responsible for the case.

Lebanon's Shi'ite Hizballah militant group is accused of carrying out the bombing of the Jewish center as well as an attack on the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires two years earlier, which killed 29 people, both allegedly at Tehran's behest.

Iran and Velayati have denied any involvement in the attacks.

Velayati is one of five top Iranian officials who Argentine investigators say ordered the attacks, along with former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who is now deceased, and former Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Commander Mohsen Rezaie.

Argentina's failure to bring any of the accused to justice in over two decades led to a longrunning scandal involving former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who negotiated a deal with Iran in 2013 that prosecutors say enabled the accused Iranians to avoid prosecution.

Fernandez and several of her aides were indicted on treason charges in December in connection with the 2013 deal, which prosecutors allege provided Iran with legal cover to escape prosecution in exchange for a normalization of relations and a grain-for-oil deal with Buenos Aires.

The agreement created a joint commission to investigate the Jewish center bombing that critics said was really a means to absolve Iran.

Fernandez has denied the charges, arguing that she made the deal because Iran and Argentina had no extradition agreement, and Argentina does not carry out trials in absentia, leaving authorities with no other way to respond to the bombings.

With reporting by AFP and Interfax </s> Argentina marks the 25th anniversary of the bomb attack on a Jewish center that left 85 people dead with a day of mourning on Thursday, but the relatives of victims are still waiting for justice.

“What comes to mind when I think of it is this moment of obscurity, a moment that was interminable, a noise, but also the silence of those of us who were there. I don’t think our minds could understand,” Anita Weinstein, a survivor of the attack, told AFP.

“This attack, even if there was a large anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic component — of course — was an attack on Argentina and Argentine society,” said Weinstein, who worked at the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA), where the attack was carried out.

A truck loaded with explosives was driven into the AMIA center in a densely populated central area of Buenos Aires, also leaving 300 people wounded.

On Wednesday, three commemorative murals to the victims were unveiled at the adjacent Clinicas Hospital where many of the victims were treated.

With its 300,000-strong Jewish community — second only to the US in the Americas — Argentina is the only country in Latin America to have suffered such an anti-Semitic attack.

But the AMIA bombing wasn’t the only one.

Two years earlier, in a context of extreme tensions between Israel and Iran, the Jewish state’s Buenos Aires embassy was hit by a suicide bomber driving a truck, killing 29 people and wounding 200.

That attack was claimed by the Islamic Jihad group while the later bombing was widely blamed on Iran and its ally, the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement.

Islamic Jihad is widely believed to have been assimilated into Hezbollah when it disappeared in the early 1990s.

On Wednesday, Argentina created a register of people and entities linked to acts of terrorism, an important step in allowing it to declare any group or person a terrorist not already listed as such by the United Nations.

But there’s no guarantee this move will ever lead to justice.

Argentina has accused top Iranian ex-officials of being behind the AMIA attack but has never been able to question them.

Decades of investigations have been beset by political interference and allegations of high-level corruption.

In 2012, then-president Cristina Kirchner signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran, which was never ratified, that would have allowed Iranian suspects in the bombing to be questioned back home.

Prosecutors investigating Kirchner for corruption now say it was effectively a cover-up to absolve Iran in return for lucrative trade deals with her government.

Despite numerous investigations into a “local connection” and a “Syrian link,” no one has ever been charged with involvement in the bombing.

A former judge who led the probe, Juan Jose Galeano, was jailed for six years in February for his role in a cover-up.

Ex-president Carlos Menem, who was the country’s leader at the time of both attacks, was acquitted of involvement in the cover-up, but his former intelligence chief Hugo Anzorreguy was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in jail for his role in obstructing the probe.

“Justice has failed miserably. It’s been 25 years since the attack and the truth is we don’t have anything,” said Diana Malamud, the wife of one of the victims and leader of a group of victims’ families called Memoria Activa (Active Memory.)

“The political power has no interest in advancing the AMIA cause,” said Mario Cimadevilla, the former head of an investigative unit into the 1994 bombing. </s> Argentina marks the 25th anniversary of the bomb attack on a Jewish center that left 85 people dead with a day of mourning on Thursday, but the relatives of victims are still waiting for justice.

"What comes to mind when I think of it is this moment of obscurity, a moment that was interminable, a noise, but also the silence of those of us who were there. I don't think our minds could understand," Anita Weinstein, a survivor of the attack, told AFP.

"This attack, even if there was a large anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic component -- of course -- was an attack on Argentina and Argentine society," said Weinstein, who worked at the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA), where the attack was carried out.

A truck loaded with explosives was driven into the AMIA center in a densely populated central area of Buenos Aires, also leaving 300 people wounded.

On Wednesday, three commemorative murals to the victims were unveiled at the adjacent Clinicas Hospital where many of the victims were treated.

With its 300,000-strong Jewish community -- second only to the US in the Americas -- Argentina is the only country in Latin America to have suffered such an anti-Semitic attack.

But the AMIA bombing wasn't the only one.

Two years earlier, in a context of extreme tensions between Israel and Iran, the Jewish state's Buenos Aires embassy was hit by a suicide bomber driving a truck, killing 29 people and wounding 200.

That attack was claimed by the Islamic Jihad group while the later bombing was widely blamed on Iran and its ally, the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement.

Islamic Jihad is widely believed to have been assimilated into Hezbollah when it disappeared in the early 1990s.

On Wednesday, Argentina created a register of people and entities linked to acts of terrorism, an important step in allowing it to declare any group or person a terrorist not already listed as such by the United Nations.

But there's no guarantee this move will ever lead to justice.

Argentina has accused top Iranian ex-officials of being behind the AMIA attack but has never been able to question them.

Decades of investigations have been beset by political interference and allegations of high-level corruption.

In 2012, then-president Cristina Kirchner signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran, which was never ratified, that would have allowed Iranian suspects in the bombing to be questioned back home.

Prosecutors investigating Kirchner for corruption now say it was effectively a cover-up to absolve Iran in return for lucrative trade deals with her government.

Despite numerous investigations into a "local connection" and a "Syrian link," no one has ever been charged with involvement in the bombing.

A former judge who led the probe, Juan Jose Galeano, was jailed for six years in February for his role in a cover-up.

Ex-president Carlos Menem, who was the country's leader at the time of both attacks, was acquitted of involvement in the cover-up, but his former intelligence chief Hugo Anzorreguy was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in jail for his role in obstructing the probe.

"Justice has failed miserably. It's been 25 years since the attack and the truth is we don't have anything," said Diana Malamud, the wife of one of the victims and leader of a group of victims' families called Memoria Activa (Active Memory.)

"The political power has no interest in advancing the AMIA cause," said Mario Cimadevilla, the former head of an investigative unit into the 1994 bombing. </s> Buenos Aires (AFP) — Argentina marks the 25th anniversary of the bomb attack on a Jewish center that left 85 people dead with a day of mourning on Thursday, but the relatives of victims are still waiting for justice.

“What comes to mind when I think of it is this moment of obscurity, a moment that was interminable, a noise, but also the silence of those of us who were there. I don’t think our minds could understand,” Anita Weinstein, a survivor of the attack, told AFP.

“This attack, even if there was a large anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic component — of course — was an attack on Argentina and Argentine society,” said Weinstein, who worked at the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA), where the attack was carried out.

A truck loaded with explosives was driven into the AMIA center in a densely populated central area of Buenos Aires, also leaving 300 people wounded.

On Wednesday, three commemorative murals to the victims were unveiled at the adjacent Clinicas Hospital where many of the victims were treated.

With its 300,000-strong Jewish community — second only to the US in the Americas — Argentina is the only country in Latin America to have suffered such an anti-Semitic attack.

But the AMIA bombing wasn’t the only one.

Two years earlier, in a context of extreme tensions between Israel and Iran, the Jewish state’s Buenos Aires embassy was hit by a suicide bomber driving a truck, killing 29 people and wounding 200.

That attack was claimed by the Islamic Jihad group while the later bombing was widely blamed on Iran and its ally, the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement.

Islamic Jihad is widely believed to have been assimilated into Hezbollah when it disappeared in the early 1990s.

On Wednesday, Argentina created a register of people and entities linked to acts of terrorism, an important step in allowing it to declare any group or person a terrorist not already listed as such by the United Nations.

But there’s no guarantee this move will ever lead to justice.

Argentina has accused top Iranian ex-officials of being behind the AMIA attack but has never been able to question them.

Decades of investigations have been beset by political interference and allegations of high-level corruption.

In 2012, then-president Cristina Kirchner signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran, which was never ratified, that would have allowed Iranian suspects in the bombing to be questioned back home.

Prosecutors investigating Kirchner for corruption now say it was effectively a cover-up to absolve Iran in return for lucrative trade deals with her government.

Despite numerous investigations into a “local connection” and a “Syrian link,” no one has ever been charged with involvement in the bombing.

A former judge who led the probe, Juan Jose Galeano, was jailed for six years in February for his role in a cover-up.

Ex-president Carlos Menem, who was the country’s leader at the time of both attacks, was acquitted of involvement in the cover-up, but his former intelligence chief Hugo Anzorreguy was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in jail for his role in obstructing the probe.

“Justice has failed miserably. It’s been 25 years since the attack and the truth is we don’t have anything,” said Diana Malamud, the wife of one of the victims and leader of a group of victims’ families called Memoria Activa (Active Memory.)

“The political power has no interest in advancing the AMIA cause,” said Mario Cimadevilla, the former head of an investigative unit into the 1994 bombing. </s> BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Argentina's government on Thursday branded Hezbollah a terrorist organization and froze its assets, 25 years to the day after a bombing blamed on the Lebanese-based group destroyed a Jewish community center in Argentina's capital, killing 85 people.

The nation's Financial Information Unit took the action a day after President Mauricio Macri's government created a list of terrorist organizations to help coordinate actions with other nations and as the nation held memorial services for victims of the attack, for which no one has been convicted.

The unit noted that Hezbollah has been accused of responsibility for a 1992 attack on the Israeli Embassy in Argentina that killed 29 people, as well as the 1994 attack on the Argentine-Israelite Mutual Association in Buenos Aires. Hundreds were injured in both bombings.

"At the present time, Hezbollah continues to represent a current and active threat to national security and the integrity of the financial, economic order of the Argentine Republic," the unit said.

It's not clear how much impact the ruling will have or how many assets Hezbollah might have in Argentina. The group already has been put on terrorism lists by the U.S., the European Union and several other nations.

At midmorning Thursday, sirens resounded across the Argentine capital to honor the 85 people who died the nation's worst terrorist attack.

Argentine prosecutors blame Iranian officials for plotting the attack and say Hezbollah operatives carried it out. But nobody has been convicted despite years of tangled investigations. Iran has refused to turn over the former officials and ex-diplomats who now face charges, and denies any involvement.

The memorial service began with a moment of silence, followed by a reading of the names of each of the 85 victims.

"How is it possible that 25 years later there has not been a single responsible person imprisoned for this crime against humanity?" asked Ariel Eichbaum, president of the association, which is known by its Spanish initials, AMIA.

"We continue to have questions to which there are still no answers. Twenty-five years have passed and the wound remains open, a wound that cannot be closed without justice," he added.

The investigation into the attack was plagued with irregularities from the start. A court in 2004 absolves about 20 people who initially had been accused of being the "local connection" for the attack and called for an investigation into a possible coverup by the government of President Carlos Menem, who had left office in 1999.

A court this year cleared Menem of charges he had interfered to protect a friend implicated in the case. But the initial judge in the case, two prosecutors and a former intelligence police chief were found guilty of embezzlement and cover-up in the case.

Another former president, Cristina Fernández, faces trial along with 11 other people on separate charges of cover-up based on a deal with Iran that would have let a special international truth commission question those accused in the case, but with no guarantee they would be arrested. She denies any wrongdoing.

Special prosecutor Alberto Nisman originally brought such charges in 2015, but was found dead of a gunshot wound in his apartment a few days later. No one has been convicted in that case.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was flying to Argentina to attend another memorial service on Friday as well as an international counterterrorism conference.

Associated Press journalist Natacha Pisarenko contributed to this report. </s> BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Argentina’s government on Thursday branded Hezbollah a terrorist organization and froze its assets, 25 years to the day after a bombing blamed on the Lebanese-based group destroyed a Jewish community center in Argentina’s capital, killing 85 people.

The nation’s Financial Information Unit took the action a day after President Mauricio Macri’s government created a list of terrorist organizations to help coordinate actions with other nations and as the nation held memorial services for victims of the attack, for which no one has been convicted.

The unit noted that Hezbollah has been accused of responsibility for a 1992 attack on the Israeli Embassy in Argentina that killed 29 people, as well as the 1994 attack on the Argentine-Israelite Mutual Association in Buenos Aires. Hundreds were injured in both bombings.

“At the present time, Hezbollah continues to represent a current and active threat to national security and the integrity of the financial, economic order of the Argentine Republic,” the unit said.

It’s not clear how much impact the ruling will have or how many assets Hezbollah might have in Argentina. The group already has been put on terrorism lists by the U.S., the European Union and several other nations.

At midmorning Thursday, sirens resounded across the Argentine capital to honor the 85 people who died the nation’s worst terrorist attack.

Argentine prosecutors blame Iranian officials for plotting the attack and say Hezbollah operatives carried it out. But nobody has been convicted despite years of tangled investigations. Iran has refused to turn over the former officials and ex-diplomats who now face charges, and denies any involvement.

The memorial service began with a moment of silence, followed by a reading of the names of each of the 85 victims.

“How is it possible that 25 years later there has not been a single responsible person imprisoned for this crime against humanity?” asked Ariel Eichbaum, president of the association, which is known by its Spanish initials, AMIA.

“We continue to have questions to which there are still no answers. Twenty-five years have passed and the wound remains open, a wound that cannot be closed without justice,” he added.

The investigation into the attack was plagued with irregularities from the start. A court in 2004 absolves about 20 people who initially had been accused of being the “local connection” for the attack and called for an investigation into a possible coverup by the government of President Carlos Menem, who had left office in 1999.

A court this year cleared Menem of charges he had interfered to protect a friend implicated in the case. But the initial judge in the case, two prosecutors and a former intelligence police chief were found guilty of embezzlement and cover-up in the case.

Another former president, Cristina Fernández, faces trial along with 11 other people on separate charges of cover-up based on a deal with Iran that would have let a special international truth commission question those accused in the case, but with no guarantee they would be arrested. She denies any wrongdoing.

Special prosecutor Alberto Nisman originally brought such charges in 2015, but was found dead of a gunshot wound in his apartment a few days later. No one has been convicted in that case.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was flying to Argentina to attend another memorial service on Friday as well as an international counterterrorism conference.

Associated Press journalist Natacha Pisarenko contributed to this report.
Argentine Justice and Human Rights Minister Germán Garavano says that all countries are responsible to extradite the Iranian accused of the AMIA bombing to Argentina in case they ever set foot on their soil.