TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's Intelligence Ministry said on Saturday U.S. agents had armed and trained those behind a deadly blast in a mosque last month and that pipelines in the country's oil-rich south were also among the planned targets.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday Iran hadevidence the United States, Britain and Israel were involved inthe April 12 blast in the southern city of Shiraz that killed14 people and wounded 200.
Iranian officials had initially said the explosion duringan evening prayer sermon was caused by explosives left overfrom an exhibition commemorating the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.
The Islamic Republic, which is embroiled in a standoff withthe West over Tehran's disputed nuclear plans, has yet to makepublic evidence against those arrested and the allegedinvolvement of its old foes.
Iran's allegations about the Shiraz explosions are similarto accusations U.S. officials have made about Iranian supportfor militias in Iraq that have fought U.S. and U.S.-backedgovernment forces there, charges Tehran denies.
Tehran has in the past accused Washington and London oftrying to destabilise Iran by supporting rebels, mainly thosein sensitive border areas.
Intelligence Minister Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said onWednesday 15 Iranians had been arrested in connection with theblast and they had also plotted to attack a Russian consulatein northern Iran.
His ministry issued a new statement on Saturday, saying oneof those behind the bombing was killed in an arrest operation.
It also added to the list of the group's suspected targetsto include oil pipelines, a book fair in the capital Tehran aswell as scientific, religious and educational facilities.
"This network that the Americans had armed with differentterrorist tools such as chemicals, explosive materials,dangerous and poisonous cyanide ... was guided directly byAmericans agents into Iran," it said in a statement carried bythe official IRNA news agency.
It said confessions of those arrested "show that Americanagents had told members of this network that their main missionwas to spread fear among people in different cities".
Blowing up southern oil pipelines was among the group'stargets and this was why "American centres had set up divingclasses for this network to identify oil pipelines in thePersian Gulf", the statement said.
Weapons, explosives and maps were among item seized fromthose arrested, the Intelligence Ministry said.
Security is normally tight in Shi'ite Muslim Iran and bombattacks have been rare although several people were killed in2005 and 2006 in blasts in a southwestern province with a largeSunni Arab population.
(Writing by Zahra Hosseinian; Editing by Alison Williams)
