The US government has concluded that retired FBI agent Robert Levinson, who vanished more than a decade ago, died while in the custody of Iran, his family and administration officials said on Wednesday.
The circumstances and timing of Levinson’s death was unclear, but US National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said that the US believes Levinson “may have passed away some time ago.”
Hours earlier, his family said information that US officials had received had led them to conclude that he was dead, though it did not describe the nature of the information.
Photo: AP
The family said in a statement announcing Levinson’s death that it was believed to have occurred before the COVID-19 outbreak, which has gravely affected Iran.
The government’s acknowledgment of Levinson’s death came hours after a White House briefing in which US President Donald Trump appeared to equivocate on the news, saying: “I won’t accept that he’s dead.”
US officials communicated the news to Levinson’s family in a meeting in Washington in recent weeks, said a person familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private encounter.
The person said that the information about Levinson had come from Iran’s foreign minister.
“It is impossible to describe our pain,” the family’s statement said. “Our family will spend the rest of our lives without the most amazing man, a new reality that is inconceivable to us. His grandchildren will never meet him. They will know him only through the stories we tell them.”
Levinson disappeared on March 9, 2007, when he was scheduled to meet a source on the Iranian island of Kish.
For years, US officials would say only that Levinson was working independently on a private investigation.
However, a 2013 investigation revealed that Levinson had been sent on a mission by CIA analysts who had no authority to run such an operation.
The Trump administration has made it a priority to seek the release of US hostages and prisoners detained overseas.
Last week, administration officials touted the release from Lebanon of a New Hampshire restaurant owner jailed on decades-old allegations and the medical furlough of a Navy veteran from an Iranian prison.
The Levinson family thanked multiple US officials for their help, including FBI Director Chris Wray, CIA Director Gina Haspel, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and O’Brien, who before his post as national security adviser also served as the Department of State’s chief hostage negotiator.
“Those who are responsible for what happened to Bob Levinson, including those in the US government who for many years repeatedly left him behind, will ultimately receive justice for what they have done,” the family statement said.
“We will spend the rest of our lives making sure of this, and the Iranian regime must know we will not be going away,” it added.
The family said it does not know when or if Levinson’s body would be returned for burial.
At a White House briefing on the coronavirus, Trump resisted confirming the family’s account, saying that Iranian officials had not told the US that Levinson was dead.
He also acknowledged that “it’s not looking promising” and said Levinson, who had diabetes and high blood pressure, had “some rough problems” even prior to his disappearance.
“He was a great gentleman,” he said.
The White House’s acting national intelligence director appeared to confirm Levinson’s death with a tweeted statement conveying condolences to the family.
By the evening, the White House issued a new statement designed to remove some of the uncertainty expressed by the president.
“As President Trump said today, Iran must provide a complete accounting of what occurred with Bob Levinson before the United States can fully accept what happened in this case,” O’Brien said. “While the investigation is ongoing, we believe that Bob Levinson may have passed away some time ago.”
The family received a video in late 2010 and proof-of-life photographs in 2011 in which he appeared disheveled with a long beard and wearing an orange prison jumpsuit like those given to detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison. Even then, his whereabouts and fate were not known.
Although, Iran repeatedly has said it has no information about Levinson, US diplomats and investigators have long said they thought he was taken by Iranian government agents.
In November last year, the Iranian government unexpectedly responded to a UN query by saying that Levinson was the subject of an “open case” in Iranian Revolutionary Court.
The development gave the family a burst of hope, but Iran clarified that the “open case” was simply an investigation into his disappearance.
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