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Iran behind Thailand bombings, Ehud Barak claims Iran behind Thailand blasts, claims Israel's Ehud Barak
(40 minutes later)
The Israeli defence minister has accused Iran of being behind a bungled bombing in Thailand. Israel has accused Iran over the three blasts in Bangkok that injured five people and blew off the legs of the alleged bomber – an Iranian national who was fleeing police when the grenade slipped through his hands and detonated besides him.
An Iranian man blew off one of his legs and injured at least four other people in one of two explosions that happened in the capital, Bangkok. A second suspect was arrested at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport after authorities found explosive materials in a house apparently rented by the bomber and two others. A third suspect is still at large, according to Thai police.
Speaking during an official trip to Singapore, Ehud Barak said the attack "proves once again that Iran and its proxies continue to perpetrate terror". He claimed Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah were "unrelenting terror elements endangering the stability of the region and endangering the stability of the world". The suspect has been identified as Saeid Moradi, an Iranian national who is thought to have entered Thailand from South Korea on 8 February at the southern resort town of Phuket. The second suspect has been named as Iranian national Mohammed Hazaei, 42, who was detained after trying to board a flight to Malaysia, according to local media.
A statement from the Israeli defence ministry said Barak had been in Bangkok on Sunday. The blasts started at about 2pm local time on Tuesday, when a bomb accidentally detonated inside the assailant's house in Ekkamai, a bustling residential district in east Bangkok. The blast blew off part of the roof, causing two occupants to flee, police said, followed by a wounded and bloodied Moradi.
The target of the Bangkok blasts remains unclear. They happened a day after two bomb attacks aimed at Israeli diplomats in India and Georgia. "He tried to wave down a taxi, but he was covered in blood, and the driver refused to take him," Police General Pansiri Prapawat told Associated Press.
Israel said Iran was to blame for the bombings in India and Georgia – a claim denounced by Tehran as "sheer lies". Moradi then threw a grenade at the taxi, injuring the driver and four others.
Thai security forces found more explosives in the suspect's rented house in the capital, the police's General Pansiri Prapawat told reporters. When police tried to stop the man, he threw another grenade at them, which local media reported as bouncing off a tree and detonating in front of him, blowing both of his legs off, one of which landed in the playground of a nearby school.
Police said the explosions happened on Soi Sukhumvit 71, a street running off a busy road that bisects the capital. Doctors at Chulalongkorn Hospital, where the bomber is being treated, said the second leg had to be amputated above the knee.
A photo posted on Twitter showed a wounded man lying on a pavement outside a school, one of his legs blown off by an explosion. The pavement was strewn with broken glass. A satchel found nearby the blast contained Iranian currency, US dollars and Thai baht, and was inspected by a bomb disposal unit.
Several Thai television stations reported that the man had been carrying explosives. They said an identification card found in a nearby satchel indicated he was of Iranian descent. Authorities are still trying to determine if the attack was organised, and if so, by whom. The Thai foreign ministry is expected to talk to Iran about the blast, local media reported.
The Thai-Asean News network said police had identified the man as Sayed Murabi, an Iranian. He is thought to have set off a bomb at his own house and then hailed a taxi. The Bangkok Post released a photo of the assailant after the blast, his face lacerated and bloodied from the attack. Another photo posted on Twitter just after the explosion showed a man, allegedly Moradi, lying in front of a school amid shards of glass, his body slumped on the pavement. No children were injured in the incident.
When the driver refused to pick him up, Murabi reportedly threw a grenade at the car. Police then pursued him before he tried to throw another grenade at them, but failed and blew off his own leg. A police raid on the assailant's house found a cache of C4 explosives and remote control detonators. These are now being investigated, government spokeswoman Thitima Chaisaeng told the Bangkok Post.
The first explosion happened at about 2.20pm local time (7.20am GMT) at a house in the Ekamai area of central Bangkok, which three Iranians reportedly rented. The blasts occurred just a day after bombs targeted Israeli diplomats in India and Georgia, injuring four in India. Israel blamed Iran for the attacks. Iran denied any responsibility.
Police fear there may be more bombs in the area and have closed the street to traffic. Thailand was alert to a potential bomb attack. "There was some warning of a possible attack and police were monitoring, but we did not know where it would happen," Thai national police chief Phrewphan Damapong told reporters.
Doctors at the Chulalongkorn hospital confirmed that a man had been admitted as a patient, but did not disclose his name or nationality. The capital has been on edge since Thai police charged a Lebanese man suspected of planning an attack in Bangkok following a US warning of a threat of a terrorist strike on tourist areas last month, although Thai police said they had found no direct link.
Doctors said the patient's right leg had been blown off above the knee, and his left leg was so badly damaged that it had had to be amputated above the knee. Thai police have not yet divulged motives for Tuesday'sblasts, but the Israeli defence minister, Ehud Barak, accused Iran outrightly.
Local media reported police as saying one of the bomber's legs had been blown into the grounds of a nearby school. "The attempted terror attack in Thailand proves once again that Iran and its proxies continue to operate in the ways of terror and the latest attacks are an example of that," said Barak.
Reports said security was being boosted at the hospital, with police unsure whether or not to classify the man as a terrorist. He said Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah are "unrelenting terror elements endangering the stability of the region and endangering the stability of the world".
In Jerusalem, the Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, Yigal Palmor, said there was not yet any sign that any targets in Bangkok were Israeli or Jewish.In Jerusalem, the Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, Yigal Palmor, said there was not yet any sign that any targets in Bangkok were Israeli or Jewish.
Israeli police have increased the state of alert in the country, with the emphasis on public places, foreign embassies and offices, as well as Ben-Gurion international airport. Israeli police have raised the state of alert in the country, with the emphasis on public places, foreign embassies and offices, as well as Ben-Gurion International Airport.
The US embassy in Bangkok has released an emergency message to all US citizens in the capital, stressing the need for "heightened awareness" of any suspicious behaviour, while the Thai prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, urged the public not to panic, saying it was still too early to assume terrorists were responsible for the blast.
The explosions come just a month after the US embassy warned that "foreign terrorists" were poised to attack Bangkok and a Lebanese-Swedish man with alleged links to pro-Iranian Hezbollah was detained by police at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport. Authorities later discovered a warehouse filled with nearly four tonnes of urea fertiliser and several gallons of liquid ammonium nitrate.
Thai authorities had said that Thailand appeared to be a staging ground but not the target of an attack.
Police general Pansiri said that so far, there were no links between last month's case and Tuesday's blasts.
Will Hartley, Editor of IHS Jane's Terrorism & Insurgency Centre, said: "While Israel's claims that Iran and Hezbollah are behind the attacks in India and Georgia cannot be discounted, at this stage it's impossible to substantiate such allegations, and it is unclear why Iran would risk an attack on Israeli interests in India, when India has been broadly supportive of Iran during the recent nuclear sanctions debate, and is one of Iran's most important trade partners.
"The alleged perpetrator of today's attempted attack in Thailand reportedly possessed an Iranian passport, possibly lending credence to Israel's allegation that Iran is waging some kind of international campaign. However, the attacks in India, Georgia and now Thailand have all been highly amateurish, and lack the sophistication that would normally be expected from an operation executed by either Hezbollah or Iran's own external operations wing, the Quds Force."