Kremlin says unclear if Putin to go to Iran

Mon Oct 15, 2007 11:16am BST
 
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TEHRAN/WIESBADEN (Reuters) - The Kremlin said on Monday it was unclear whether Russian President Vladimir Putin would go ahead with his visit to Iran after a report of a possible plot to assassinate Putin in Tehran.

"We don't have information on whether he is going or not," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said by telephone from Tehran.

"The visit is not yet confirmed. The reason is the information about a possible terrorist attack on President Putin," Kremlin spokesman Alexander Smirnov told Reuters in Wiesbaden, where Putin met German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Asked when a decision would be taken on whether Putin will indeed fly to Tehran, Smirnov said: "Today." He did not elaborate.

Russia's Interfax news agency reported on Sunday evening, citing a single unnamed security service source, that Putin had been warned by his special services of a possible assassination plot during his visit to Tehran this week.

Putin's visit, the first by a Kremlin leader to Iran since Josef Stalin in 1943, has drawn intense interest because of Russia's role as a mediator in six-power talks designed to rein in Iran's nuclear ambitions.

 
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