Iranian authorities late on the evening of 17 March confirmed the assassination of Ali Larijani, the influential head of the country’s security service. He is the highest Iranian official to die since the assassination of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on the first day of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran on 28 February.
Ali Larijani died along with his son Morteza, deputy Alireza Bayat and several security guards, the secretariat of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said in a statement.
The council’s statement came about 12 hours after Israeli Defence Minister Israel Israel Katz said Larijani was killed in a wave of airstrikes on Tehran that also killed other senior Iranian figures.