By Richard Spencer in Dubai, Andrew Osborn in Moscow and Bruno Waterfield in Brussels
Abdol Malek Rigi, Iran's most wanted man, was shown by television cameras being hauled off a jet in handcuffs by four men wearing balaclavas.
Officials were vague about the details of the arrest, but state media said Rigi had been on board a flight from Dubai to Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan, after visiting a US military base in Afghanistan.
'Bishkek airport confirmed that Kyrgyzstan Airways flight QH454 from Dubai had arrived several hours late yesterday after being told to land by Iran.
Iran's intelligence minister, Heydar Moslehi, claimed that Rigi, the leader of the Sunni terror group Jundullah, had been at the US base 24 hours before his arrest.
At a dramatic press conference he flourished a photograph which he said showed Rigi outside the base with two other men, though he gave no details of where the base was, or how or when the photograph was obtained.
The photograph itself gave no clues as to the location. Photographs were also shown of an Afghan passport and identity card said to have been given by the Americans to Rigi.
Mr Moslehi also alleged that Rigi had met the then Nato secretary-general, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, in Afghanistan in 2008, and had visited European countries.
He said agents had tracked Rigi's movements for five months, calling his arrest "a great defeat for the US and UK".
Iran has repeatedly claimed that Jundullah, which has carried out a series of bombings in support of demands for better treatment for the border region of Balochistan, is backed directly by Pakistan but also by Britain, Israel and America.
It has also been alleged by western media, including The Sunday Telegraph, that in 2007 CIA provided funding and weapons to Jundullah.
The group's most serious attack, in October last year, killed two generals of the Revolutionary Guard along with more than 40 of their men and tribal chiefs whom they were meeting in a town in Balochistan near the border with Pakistan.
Previously, it blew up a Shia mosque killing 25 people in May, following which 18 members of the group were executed. Rigi's brother, Abdol Hamid Rigi, was reprieved at the last moment after agreeing to give evidence against his brother, who he said had received money from the United States.
According to one report yesterday, Rigi was arrested "outside the country", according to another, in Pakistan. A third version said the plane landed in Sistan-Balochistan itself.
Pakistan is said to have been co-operating with Iran recently in arresting Jundullah members.
"This is another disgrace for countries who claim human rights," the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman, Ramin Mehmanparast, said.
American involvement was denied by a US official. "This is of course a totally bogus accusation," the official said. A Foreign Office spokesman said it did not comment on intelligence matters.
A spokesman for Nato "flatly denied" that any meeting had taken place between Mr Scheffer and Rigi, although Mr Scheffer did visit Afghanistan in 2008.
Asked whether Rigi could have met an ISAF officer, the spokesman said: "It is the first I have ever heard of any Nato officials meeting people like that."
The Iranian operation is another example of foreign intelligence agents using Dubai's open border policy to follow a "target", shortly after the assassination in the emirate of a senior Hamas official.
Dubai has long had close ties to Iran, but has been under considerable pressure to rein them in. There was a hint of Iran's annoyance at this change of policy in Mr Moslehi's press conference.
"He was arrested on a flight from Dubai to Kyrgyzstan," Mr Moslehi said. "It is such a scandal for Dubai in this incident, which shows that the Zionist regime, by using the US and Europe, is seeking to turn the region into a haven for terrorists.
"This scandal cannot be covered up."
The Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/7300767/Iran-arrests-most-wanted-man-after-police-board-civilian-flight.html
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