By Thomas Erdbrink
The Washington, Post, Tehran, 25 Nov 2011 – A massive blast at a missile base operated by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps nearly two weeks ago was the latest in a series of mysterious incidents involving explosions at natural gas transport facilities, oil refineries and military bases blasts that have caused dozens of deaths and damage to key infrastructure in the past two years.
Iranian officials said the Nov. 12 blast at the missile base was an accident, and they ruled out any sabotage organized by the United States and its regional allies. The explosion on the Shahid Modarres base near the city of Malard was so powerful that it shook the capital, Tehran, about 30 miles to the east.
Suspicions that covert action might already be underway were raised when four key gas pipelines exploded simultaneously in different locations in Qom Province in April. Lawmaker Parviz Sorouri told the semiofficial Mehr News Agency that the blasts were the work of terrorists and were organized by the enemies of the Islamic Republic.
Iran in recent years has improved its ability to hunt spies, using reviews of travel and expense records to round up Iranians suspected of selling information to U.S., British and Israeli intelligence services, the Associated Press reported Monday.
In May, Intelligence Minister Heidar Moslehi announced the arrest of 30 CIA spies who he said had been recruited to map out Iran’s energy infrastructure.
One of their main objectives was carrying out sabotage activities, Moslehi said, according to the semiofficial Fars News Agency.
Iran’s parliament launched an investigation into the blast at the missile site but did not issue any findings this week as promised. One lawmaker, Mohammad Kazem Hejazi, said revealing such information might give away secrets to the enemy, the Iranian Labor News Agency reported Tuesday.
We are not ruling out sabotage in the Malard missile base, said one source close to the Revolutionary Guards, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject. It is not impossible to bribe a single person into doing something bad.
On Wednesday, an explosion rocked a stronghold in southern Lebanon of Iran’s regional ally, Hezbollah, which is widely believed to be supplied with Iranian missiles capable of hitting major urban centers in Israel. Hezbollah did not comment on the cause of the blast but denied that it occurred at one of the group’s arms depots, Beirut’s Daily Star newspaper reported.
Iran has accused the United States and Israel of organizing the assassinations of three nuclear scientists in Tehran since 2010. The government has also blamed both countries for a computer virus called Stuxnet, which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad acknowledged had disabled centrifuges used to enrich uranium.
In a sign that relations between Iran and the West are further deteriorating, Iran’s parliament voted Wednesday to consider expelling the British ambassador to Tehran. The preliminary vote came after Britain on Tuesday joined the United States and Canada in adopting new financial sanctions against the Islamic Republic. If carried out, an expulsion could prompt other European countries to withdraw their ambassadors, diplomatic sources said.