BAGHDAD (AFP)
The U.S. military on Monday accused Iranian special forces of using Lebanon's Hezbollah fighters to train Iraqi extremists, a charge Iran dismissed as ridiculous.
Brigadier General Kevin Bergner told reporters that U.S.-led forces had captured a senior Hezbollah militant, Ali Musa Daqduq, who confessed to training Iraqi extremists in Iran to carry out attacks in Iraq.
Daqduq, a Lebanese, was captured in Iraq's southern city of Basra on March 20, Bergner said, after being sent by senior Lebanese Hezbollah leadership to Iran in 2005 to work with Iran's Quds Force to train Iraqi extremists.
He said the Quds Force, a unit of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, and Hezbollah were jointly operating camps near Tehran in which they trained Iraqi fighters before sending them back to Iraq to wage attacks.
"He (Daqduq) was directed by the Iranian Quds Force to move Iraqis in and out of Iraq and report on the training and operations of Iraqi special groups."
Bergner said the Quds Force's goal was to develop extremist groups into a network similar to Hezbollah, adding they were training between 20 and 60 Iraqis at a time.
Bergner said the military believed that "senior leadership in Iran" was aware of the activities of the Quds Force. |
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Ridiculous, replies Iran Iran dismissed the U.S. accusations as "ridiculous".
"Unfortunately these days U.S. officials have got used to crafting a succession of artificial and ridiculous scenarios for political gains without any evidence," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said.
"It has been four and a half years that U.S. officials have sought to cover up the dreadful situation in Iraq, which is a result of their mistakes and wrong strategies, by denigration and blaming others."
Previously, U.S. commanders had accused Tehran of financing and arming militants accused of carrying out the killings, but this was the first time they have accused Iranian officers of prior knowledge of the attack.
The latest accusations are part of a mounting campaign by U.S. officials to prove alleged links between Iran, Hezbollah and the violence in Iraq. |
