Lebanon 'captures Iranian embassy bombing mastermind'

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/01/lebanon-captures-iranian-embassy-bombing-mastermind

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Lebanese authorities have reportedly captured a militant leader suspected of leading a group that claimed responsibility for the bombing of the Iranian embassy in Beirut, in November.

Majid bin Muhammad al-Majid is believed to be the leader of the al-Qaida-inspired Abdullah Azzam Brigades, which claimed responsibility for the 19 November attack that killed 25 people, including an Iranian diplomat.

He is believed to have been arrested on Monday by an intelligence unit of the Lebanese military.

Twin suicide bombers carried out the attack on the embassy, forensic tests revealed. At least one of the suicide attackers was Lebanese.

The bombing was the first to target an embassy in the capital for the past 30 years and came amid several other explosions that targeted civilian neighbours in south Beirut, the heartland of the Shia Islamic militant group Hezbollah.

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades have sworn to attack military targets linked to Iran or Hezbollah, as long as the militant group actively defends the regime of Bashar al-Assad, but have said they won't attack Shia civilians. Other al-Qaida aligned groups operating in Syria, such as the Islamic state of Iraq, and Jabhat al-Nusra, have frequently targeted Shia civilians.

Hezbollah claimed Saudi Arabia was behind the Iranian embassy bombing but Riyadh strongly denied the claim. It was not yet clear which citizenship al-Majid holds.

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