The US Department of Justice has released the charges brought in connection with an Iranian plot to kill President-elect Donald Trump organized before this week's election, the Associated Press reported. .
Investigators learned of the plot to assassinate Trump from Farhad Shakeri, who had served time in US prisons for robbery and who authorities say maintained a network of criminal associates brought in by Tehran for surveillance and contract killings, the indictment filed in Federal Court in Manhattan. Shakeri told investigators that in September of this year, an acquaintance of his in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps ordered him to put aside his other work and come up with a plan within seven days to surveil and possibly kill Trump. According to the document, Shakeri was told that if he could not come up with such a plan, then Iran would delay killing the Republican, whom the Islamic Republic expected would lose the election and then be able to eliminate him more easily.< /p>
Shakeri has told the FBI that he did not intend to propose a plan to assassinate Trump within his seven-day deadline.
He is currently at large and is in Iran.
The conspiracy charges came just days after Trump defeated Democratic rival Kamala Harris in the presidential election. According to American officials, the case reflects Iran's ongoing efforts to attack representatives of the US government on American soil, including the newly elected president, AP notes.