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Iran admits military backing of Iraqis

September 29, 2014 at 1:30 pm

The Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, Major General Gholam Ali Rashid, has admitted that Iran is currently providing military advice to the Iraqi army, as well as to Hezbollah in Lebanon and the resistance movement in Palestine.

While addressing a conference in Tehran on Saturday attended by a group of senior military commanders, Iran’s official Fars news agency quoted Rashid as saying that: “Some of our commanders are in the field to give military advice to the Iraqi army, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Palestinian resistance movement.”

Previously, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Marziyeh Afkham had rejected claims about the presence of Iranian forces in Iraq to help the country’s Shiite-led government in its fight against the Islamic State organisation and its allies.

The US is currently leading a military coalition against the Islamic State, waging airstrikes against the organisation’s strongholds in both Iraq and Syria. Human Rights Watch said that at least seven civilians in Syria have already been killed as a result.

Iran is also accused of supporting the Shiite Houthi movement in Yemen, which recently seized control of the capital Sanaa by force after staging weeks of protests. Since then, the movement signed a precarious peace agreement with the current government.