The US Justice Department announced on Friday that the FBI had thwarted an "Iranian" attempt to kill US President-elect Donald Trump, before the election week, according to the Associated Press.

The department announced criminal charges Friday in a Manhattan case alleging that an Iranian Revolutionary Guard official directed someone in September to develop a plan to surveil and kill Trump.

The case papers said that the Iranian official instructed the man, named Farhad Shakeri, that if he could not develop a plan in the time frame he requested, he should halt the plan until after the US elections, because he believed that Trump would lose, and then it would be easier to assassinate him.

Shakeri told the FBI that he did not intend to present a plan to kill Trump within the 7-day period requested by the Iranian official.

The Justice Department unveiled the plan days after Trump defeated Democratic rival Kamala Harris in the November 2016 election, reflecting what federal officials describe as “an ongoing effort by Iran to target U.S. government officials, including Trump, on U.S. soil.”

According to the case papers, Shakeri was tasked by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps with carrying out assassinations against Israeli and American citizens inside the United States, but Revolutionary Guard officials told him in September to focus only on Trump, and gave him seven days to come up with a plan.

CNN reported that the Justice Department has charged two other individuals, Carlisle Rivera and Jonathan Loadholt, who were arrested in New York and charged with helping the Iranian government monitor an Iranian-American citizen.

“There are few international actors who pose a greater threat to American national security than Iran,” said US Attorney General Merrick Garland.