TEHRAN — Iran’s foreign minister called yesterday for a peaceful settlement of the Shi’ite uprising in neighboring Iraq, urging restraint on the part of the U.S. military.
“It is a strategic mistake if the U.S. thought it would deal with people with the same tactic that toppled Saddam Hussein,” Kamal Kharrazi told reporters, according to the official state news agency.
Relations between Washington and Tehran have been strained since Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution and the ensuing hostage-taking of U.S. Embassy staff by religious radicals.
Iran did not interfere with the U.S. war in Iraq and was pleased to see its old enemy Saddam ousted. But whenever violent unrest erupts in neighboring Iraq or Afghanistan, Tehran’s hard-liners gloat.
“The military forces of the occupation have created a bloody mess,” said a headline Monday in the hard-line daily Jomhouri Eslami.
The Washington Times yesterday quoted U.S. military sources as saying Iran was supporting Sheik Muqtada al-Sadr, the militant cleric whose forces are behind the past three days of fighting in southern Iraq.
One source said Sheik al-Sadr was receiving money, spiritual support and possibly arms from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and from Hezbollah, a Lebanese-based terrorist group that is backed by Iran.
Questioned at a Pentagon briefing yesterday, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said, “We know the Iranians have been meddling, and it’s unhelpful to have neighboring countries meddling in the affairs of Iraq.”
Mr. Rumsfeld said he was unaware of any direct help to the militias from Iran.
Iranian officials yesterday denied any role in instigating the uprising.
“Iran doesn’t want to see a turbulent atmosphere in Iraq,” Abbas Maleki, a former deputy foreign minister and Tehran political insider, said in an interview. “It doesn’t help Iranian national interests.”
He added: “If your neighbor’s house is on fire, it means that your home is also in danger.”
Iranian officials and humanitarian agencies had just put the finishing touches on plans to repatriate thousands of Iraqi refugees living in southwestern Iran when the latest violence erupted.
To the dismay of Iranian officials eager to unburden themselves of the Iraqis, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees announced Tuesday that it was suspending the convoys of refugees.
Iraq’s Sheik al-Sadr hails from the same activist clerical tradition as Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran’s 1979 revolution. During his first trip outside Iraq, the sheik visited Iran and reportedly met with high-level clerics.
However, Iranian authorities have given the red-carpet treatment to every Iraqi leader who visits, including pro-American businessman Ahmed Chalabi, who has close ties to the Bush administration.
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