Cyrus Hashemi

Cyrus Hashemi (also spelled Hashimi; c.1942 - 21 July 1986) was an Iranian arms dealer linked to the Iran-Contra affair and October Surprise conspiracy theory. Hashemi was named by Robert Dreyfuss as a CIA and Mossad agent; Hashemi sued Dreyfuss and Lyndon LaRouche, whose Executive Intelligence Review had linked Hashemi to funding of Iranian terrorism, with the case dismissed in June 1983 due to Hashemi's failure to respond to legal documents. Hashemi died in 1986 in London in mysterious circumstances; the official cause of death was "a rare and virulent form of leukemia that was diagnosed only two days before Hashemi died."

Hashemi and his brother Jamshid Hashemi were persecuted by the Shah's SAVAK during the 1963 White Revolution, and left Iran as a result. The Hashemis had connections with Ahmed Madani, who was exiled in 1970 and went on to become Defense Minister after the 1979 Revolution.

The Hashemis supported the 1979 Iranian Revolution, and Jamshid was appointed to oversee the national radio network, where he worked with Mehdi Karroubi's brother Hassan. Hashemi said he was a cousin to Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, an aide of the Ayatollah Khomeini who was elected Speaker of the Iranian Parliament in 1980.

According to a 1984 CIA memo, William Casey recruited John Shaheen and Cyrus Hashemi in 1979 "to sell off property in New York City belonging to the shah's Pahlavi Foundation. At that time, the radical Islamic government in Teheran was claiming that property as its own and the shah's family was desperate for the cash." From November 1980 to January 1981 wiretaps were placed in the New York offices of the First Gulf Bank and Trust Company, of which Hashemi was the head. The bank had handled clandestine money transfers for the Iranian government, with Admiral Ahmad Madani, then the Defense Minister, ordering $30–$35m transferred to an account there in late 1979.

...
Wikipedia