Former Iranian Intelligence Officer Says Iran Helped Plan 9/11 Attacks

A former Iranian intelligence official who defected has claimed that Iran helped to plot the September 11 attacks, according to court papers filed on Thursday in a victims’ lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court against the Tehran government.

This official is one of three unidentified defectors from Iran’s Ministry of Information and Security who testified under oath about “Iranian government complicity” before, during and after the terror strikes.

In addition to help devise the plan, the defector says that Iran supplied training in “airliner hijacking” and provided “material support for hundreds of al Qaeda fighters” after September 11. According to a description of the testimony in the court filing, he also said that the top leaders of al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Iran attended a series of meetings in Iran “during the months before” the attacks.

The ex-official’s testimony was made during videotaped depositions and filed under seal. It comes as part of the $100 billion civil lawsuit filed by dozens of relatives of September 11 victims against Iran, al Qaeda, the Taliban, and others.