US federal agent links with Pakistani intelligence
A federal prosecutor told a judge that one of two American males arrested in Washington for acting as US federal security personnel and cultivating access to the Secret Service, which protects Joe Biden, claimed ties to Pakistani intelligence.
Arian Taherzadeh, 40, and Haider Ali, 35, were arrested on Wednesday for posing as Department of Homeland Security investigators. Assistant attorney Joshua Rothstein of the Justice Department asked a judge not to release them.
The men are also suspected of giving lucrative favours to Secret Service agents, including one on First Lady Jill Biden’s protection detail.
Ali had travelled to Pakistan, Turkey, Iran, and Qatar in 2019, just months before the two began cultivating security professionals in their Washington apartment building, according to Rothstein. Ali had also transited Doha multiple times.
Furthermore, according to Rothstein, Ali “made assertions to witnesses that he had connections to the ISI, Pakistan’s intelligence service.”
The case is being handled by the Department of Justice (DoJ) as a criminal matter rather than a national security problem. However, four Secret Service agents have been placed on leave due to their connection with the accused.
The Secret Service said in a statement that “all personnel implicated in this problem are on administrative leave and are prohibited from accessing Secret Service buildings, equipment, or systems.”
According to an affidavit filed with the court, Taherzadeh and Ali, both US citizens, lived in a Washington apartment building with a lot of federal security personnel.
They were able to persuade some of the agents that they were special homeland security investigators by displaying uniforms and documents to back up their claims.
Both were initially charged with one count of impersonating a US official, which carries a maximum sentence of three years in jail.
However, Rothstein informed the court that the charge might be upgraded to conspiracy, which carries a five-year maximum sentence.
The two men’s motivations were unclear, but at one point they hired a third individual to work for them, giving him the task of “doing research on an unknown subject.”
