A key investigator of the deadly 1994 car bombing of Argentina’s Jewish charities headquarters building said Saturday that he was abducted and assaulted, in a stunning twist in the unsolved case.

Claudio Lifschitz, 43, told C5N TV that his attackers, who concealed their faces, abudcted him from his home and loaded him into a truck. They then tied him up, placed a plastic bag over his head and carved the initials AMIA into his back using a knife.

The attackers, who identified themselves as State Intelligence Secretary (SIDE) agents, also carved a six-digit number on his arm that matched that of the trial investigating the bombing of the Argentine Jewish Mutual Association (AMIA) building in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people and wounded 300, the report said.

Lifschitz said the men also wanted to know if he had copies of SIDE wiretaps of a group of Iranians that investigators never submitted as evidence in the trial.

He accused former judge Juan Jose Galeano, who oversaw the trial, of paying 400,000 dollars to former car dealer and police informer Carlos Telleldin, who allegedly put together the car bomb that leveled the seven-floor AMIA building, in exchange for being charged as the local connection in the bombing.

It was the worst terrorist attack on Argentine soil.

Telleldin was arrested for 10 years over the charges but was acquitted in September 2005 by a court that also exonerated four policemen that Galeano had charged.

Galeano was removed from his post and prosecuted for concealing evidence, in a case in which former president Carlos Menem is being investigated.

National media reports have speculated that Menem’s government may have taken action to get the investigation off the Iranian track.

In March 2007, Interpol issued arrest warrants for five senior Iranian officials and a Lebanese national sought by Argentina for their alleged role in the bombing.

The AMIA bombing was the second major attack on Jewish targets in Buenos Aires that decade.

(Source: AFP / EJP)