Help Palestine [hidayahnet] Iran closes border with northern Iraq

ahmedsohail siddiqui Thu, 27 Sep 2007 14:03:18 -0700

Iran closes border with northern Iraq         By YAHYA BARZANJI, Associated 
Press Writer 58 minutes ago

SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq - Iran closed major border crossings with northern Iraq on
Monday to protest the U.S. detention of an Iranian official the military
accused of weapons smuggling, a Kurdish official said.
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At least four border gates have been closed and one remains open, the
governor of the Kurdish province of Sulaimaniyah, Dana Ahmed Majeed, told The
Associated Press. The move threatens the economy of Iraq's northern region
one of the country's few success stories.
In Tehran, the public relations department in Iran's Interior Ministry said
no decision had been taken to shut the border.
But Kurdish authorities said the Iranians began shutting down the crossing
points late Sunday near the border towns of Banjiwin, Haj Omran, Halabja and
Khanaqin.
The closings came four days after U.S. troops arrested an Iranian official
during a raid on a hotel in Sulaimaniyah, 160 miles northeast of Baghdad.
U.S. officials said he was a member of the elite Quds force of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guards that smuggles weapons into Iraq. But Iraqi and Iranian
leaders said he was in the country on official business and with the full
knowledge of the government.
"This closure from the Iranian side will have a bad effect on the economic
situation of the Kurdish government and will hurt the civilians as well," said
Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the autonomous Kurdish government. "We are
paying the price of what the Americans have done by arresting the Iranian."
A U.S. military spokesman, Rear Adm. Mark Fox, also said Sunday that Iran has
smuggled advanced weapons into Iraq for use against American troops, including
the Misagh 1, a portable surface-to-air missile that uses an infrared guidance
system and could threaten U.S. aviation.
Iran has denied U.S. allegations that it is smuggling weapons to Shiite
militias in Iraq, a denial that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
reiterated in an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes" that aired Sunday.
"We don't need to do that. We are very much opposed to war and insecurity,"
said Ahmadinejad, who arrived in New York Sunday to attend the U.N. General
Assembly. "The insecurity in Iraq is detrimental to our interests."
But the U.S. insists it has evidence to the contrary. On Monday, U.S. troops
killed one suspected militant and detained four others said to be involved in
kidnapping operations run by Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Baghdad's Shiite
district of Sadr City, the military said.
The latest detention of an Iranian official also has taxed relations between
Iraq and the United States, already strained after the shooting deaths of 11
civilians at Nisoor Square in Baghdad on Sept. 16 allegedly at the hands of
Blackwater USA security contractors.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has said the Blackwater incident was among
several "serious challenges to the sovereignty of Iraq" by the company, adding
he would take the case up in discussions with President Bush in New York, on
the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.
Blackwater denies its guards fired illegally and says they were defending
themselves from armed insurgents.
Al-Maliki also condemned the Iranian's arrest, saying he understood the man,
who has been identified as Mahmudi Farhadi, had been invited to Iraq. U.S.
officials said he was a member of the elite Quds force of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guards accused of smuggling weapons into Iraq.
"The government of Iraq is an elected one and sovereign. When it gives a
visa, it is responsible for the visa," al-Maliki told The Associated Press in
an interview Sunday in New York. "We consider the arrest ... of this individual
who holds an Iraqi visa and a (valid) passport to be unacceptable."
Last week, President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, demanded the Iranian's release
and warned in a letter to America's top commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus,
and the U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker, that Iran had threatened to close its
border with Iraq's Kurdish region over the case.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said Sunday that
Farhadi was in charge of border transactions in western Iran and went to Iraq
on an official invitation. The U.S. military said the suspect was being
questioned about "his knowledge of, and involvement in," the transportation of
EFPs and other roadside bombs from Iran into Iraq and his possible role in the
training of Iraqi insurgents in Iran. No charges against the Iranian have been
filed yet. In more violence Monday, an Iraqi security guard was killed and
three others were wounded when a car bomb exploded near the convoy of a local
security official near the northern city of Kirkuk, police Brig. Gen. Sarhat
Qadir said. ___ Associated Press writers Bushra Juhi and Hamid Ahmed in
Baghdad contributed to this report.

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Help Palestine [hidayahnet] Iran closes border with northern Iraq

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