Obama: Iranian leaders must be held accountable

President Obama said Thursday morning he isn’t sure if top Iranian leaders personally knew of an alleged plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States, but said they should be held accountable anyway.

“Even if at the highest levels there was no detailed operational knowledge,” Obama said, “there has to be accountability with respect to anybody in the Iranian government engaging in this kind of activity.”

In his first public remarks since details of the alleged plot were released earlier this week, Obama said Iran must “answer to the international community” for anybody in their government engaged in terrorist activity.

Around the world, American diplomats are spelling out evidence of the purported plot for world leaders and laying the groundwork for U.S. requests to come -- tougher sanctions on Iran and, ultimately, greater isolation by the international community.

Eight years after the U.S. shared faulty intelligence about weapons of mass destruction supposedly held in Iraq, some governments are skeptical of any new intelligence reports from Washington.

But in a morning news conference with the South Korean president, at the White House this week for a state visit, Obama said he has no doubt that Iranian government officials at some level were aware of the plot.

Once people have had a chance to analyze the facts, Obama said, “there will not be a dispute” about what happened.

Obama seemed to acknowledge that he doesn’t know for certain that knowledge of the alleged plot reached to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or to the country’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.

But he argued they should still be held accountable.

“The important thing is for Iran to answer to the international community why anybody in their government is engaging in this kind of activity,” Obama said.