Tehran, March 18 – Iran’s Supreme National Security Council confirmed that its secretary, Ali Larijani, was killed in an attack, according to Iran’s Tasnim news agency, which reported the news early Wednesday.
In a statement, the council said that Larijani, along with his son Morteza Larijani, deputy for security affairs at the council’s secretariat, Alireza Bayat, and several others, died early Tuesday, Tasnim reported.
The council praised Larijani’s long service to Iran’s development and called for national unity in the face of external threats, according to Xinhua news agency.
On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel had killed Larijani during ongoing strikes on Iran.
Meanwhile, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps confirmed the death of Gholamreza Soleimani, head of the Basij volunteer force, in a US-Israeli strike.
The deaths occurred amid heightened regional tensions following joint US-Israeli strikes on Iran, which began on February 28, to which Iran and its regional allies responded with attacks on Israeli and US interests across the Middle East.
Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi has roundly rejected any new contact with Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff. Western media reported that Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei rejected proposals to reduce tensions or negotiate a ceasefire with the United States.
The IRGC launched a new “Haj Qasem” ballistic missile for the first time against Israel, describing it as a precision-guided weapon named after the slain commander, Qassem Soleimani, according to Tasnim news agency.