ICBPS- A Boston-based unregistered agent of the Islamic Republic of Iran has been arrested and charged with acting as foreign agent of Tehran.
U.S. Department of Justice announced on Tuesday that “a criminal complaint was unsealed today in federal court in Brooklyn charging Kaveh Lotfolah Afrasiabi, also known as Lotfolah Kaveh Afrasiabi, with acting and conspiring to act as an unregistered agent of the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, in violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA)”.
“Federal prosecutors said the 63-year-old agent was to make an initial appearance in US District Court in Massachusetts Tuesday after his arrest one day earlier at his home in Watertown on charges of conspiracy to act as an unregistered foreign agent and acting as a foreign agent without registration.”
“Afrasiabi allegedly sought to influence the American public and American policymakers for the benefit of his employer, the Iranian government, by disguising propaganda as objective policy analysis and expertise,” said Acting U.S. Attorney DuCharme. “This Office is committed to the robust enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which provides the American people the tools they need to evaluate opinions and arguments in the marketplace of ideas by requiring foreign agents to declare their paymasters. Those, like the defendant, who conceal the full extent of their work for a foreign government when the law requires disclosure will face consequences for their actions,” Seth DuCharme, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.
