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Saturday, 20 August 2005 |
 Los Angeles Times: As the deadline bore down on Iraqi leaders drafting a new constitution, some participants said a deal seemed within reach. Then out of nowhere, they said, came a demand from a key Shiite politician. Abdelaziz Hakim, the leader of the main party in the powerful Shiite parliamentary bloc, spoke before a crowd of supporters Aug. 11 in Najaf and called for a Shiite autonomous region consisting of Iraq's nine oil-rich southern provinces. Hakim, who once headed a militia trained and nurtured by Iran's hard-line Revolutionary Guard, called the mini-state a "sacred" goal. |
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Saturday, 20 August 2005 |
 Sunday Telegraph: British soldiers in Iraq are being killed by advanced "infra-red" bombs supplied by Iran that defeat jamming equipment, according to military intelligence officials. The "passive infra-red" devices, whose use in Iraq is revealed for the first time by The Sunday Telegraph, are detonated when the beam is broken, as when an intruder triggers a burglar alarm. |
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Friday, 19 August 2005 |
 The Washington Times: Iran is continuing to supply weapons to insurgents in Iraq with the goal of creating an Islamist government, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said. "I see intelligence reports and we know that we're finding Iranian weapons inside the country," Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters on his way to visit Paraguay earlier this week. "They don't just get there by accident. They don't fly there.
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Thursday, 18 August 2005 |
 Iran Focus: London, Aug. 18 – Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told a London-based Arabic newspaper on Wednesday that Iran continues to be the transit point for arms smuggled to insurgents in Iraq. “Credible intelligence shows that arms smuggling continues through the Iran-Iraq border and the shipment of arms to terrorist groups in Iraq is a clear reality”, Zebari said in an interview with the daily Al-Hayat. |
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Tuesday, 16 August 2005 |
 AFP: US forces have found Iranian weapons inside Iraq on more than one occasion over the past couple of months, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday. Rumsfeld, who was here for talks with Paraguayan leaders, told reporters on the flight from Washington that "no one ought to be surprised" by the arms smuggling since Iran would like to replicate its own Islamic regime in Iraq. |
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Sunday, 14 August 2005 |
 Iran Focus: Baghdad, Aug. 15 - The Multinational Force in Iraq on Sunday strongly condemned the abduction earlier this month of two Iranian dissidents who were protected persons under the Geneva Conventions.
The U.S.-led force announced that the two members of the opposition group People's Mojahedin or Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MeK) were abducted on August 4 in eastern Baghdad while on a routine logistics trip to Baghdad. |
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Sunday, 14 August 2005 |
 Daily Telegraph: At least nine British soldiers have been murdered in Iraq by terrorists working for the radical Islamic regime in neighbouring Iran, it was reported last night. |
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Sunday, 14 August 2005 |
 AFP: An influx of Iranians and Iranian weapons is hampering efforts to bring peace and democracy to violence-wracked Iraq, Washington's ambassador to the country said Sunday. "Weapons and people coming across the border to undermine Iraq must be stopped, and we're working with the Iraqis, including the prime minister, to make this message clear to the Iranians," Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told CNN television. |
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Sunday, 14 August 2005 |
 Time Magazine: The U.S. military's new nemesis in Iraq is named Abu Mustafa al-Sheibani, and he is not a Baathist or a member of al-Qaeda. He is working for Iran.
According to a U.S. military-intelligence document obtained by Time, al-Sheibani heads a network of insurgents created by
the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps with the express purpose of committing violence against U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. |
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Wednesday, 10 August 2005 |
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Daily Telegraph: Britain formally protested to Iran yesterday over its growing interference in Iraq's internal affairs, citing the smuggling of sophisticated explosives that threaten to send coalition casualties soaring. The move came after British and American intelligence officials said they uncovered evidence that Iran's Revolutionary Guard was providing deadly "shaped" charges to Iraq's insurgents. They are also thought to be providing training and other weapons. |
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Wednesday, 10 August 2005 |
 The Guardian: Britain yesterday described as "unacceptable" the smuggling of weapons from Iran into Iraq after revealing that a consignment was intercepted at the border between the two countries.
While complaints have been made in the past, it is relatively rare to have concrete evidence of such smuggling. |
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Wednesday, 10 August 2005 |
 AP: British authorities are telling Iran to better secure its border against weapons reportedly being smuggled into Iraq. They've lodged a complaint to the Iranian government, after a stash of bomb-making supplies was found in southern Iraq. A senior official says it included timers, detonators and other devices. |
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Tuesday, 09 August 2005 |
 Washington Post: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday that weapons have been found in Iraq that were "clearly, unambiguously" from Iran and that the weapons would ultimately become a problem for Tehran. |
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Tuesday, 09 August 2005 |
 AFP: US intelligence believes that a cache of manufactured bombs seized in Iraq about two weeks ago was smuggled into the country from Iran by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, an intelligence official said Tuesday. "We believe they came from Iran's Revolutionary Guards," the official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity. |
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Friday, 05 August 2005 |
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New York Times: Many of the new, more sophisticated roadside bombs used to attack American and government forces in Iraq have been designed in Iran and shipped in from there, United States military and intelligence officials said Friday, raising the prospect of increased foreign help for Iraqi insurgents. American commanders say the deadlier bombs could become more common as insurgent bomb makers learn the techniques to make the weapons themselves in Iraq. |
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Thursday, 04 August 2005 |
 UPI: Iran is shipping more powerful and sophisticated military-caliber bombs to Iraqi guerrillas for use against U.S.-led coalition forces, NBC News reported yesterday. Citing U.S. military and intelligence officials, the network said U.S. soldiers intercepted a large shipment of high explosives last week, smuggled into northeastern Iraq from Iran. |
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Thursday, 04 August 2005 |
 Reuters: U.S. Ambassador John Bolton, in his debut in the U.N. Security Council, pressed Syria and Iran on Thursday to do more to stem the flow of terrorists, arms and funding into neighboring Iraq. His comments came as the 15-nation council unanimously adopted a U.S.-drafted resolution condemning a recent surge in violence in Iraq that has killed hundreds, ... |
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Tuesday, 02 August 2005 |
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Iran Focus: London, Aug. 02 – Iraq’s Foreign Minister once again called on Iran and Syria to control their borders to prevent insurgents entering Iraq, in an interview on Tuesday with a London-based Arab daily. Hoshyar Zebari held the two governments responsible for the flow of foreign fighters and told the daily Asharq al-Awsat that the two neighbours had the power to stop infiltrations but had been unwilling to do so. |
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Sunday, 31 July 2005 |
 The Independent on Sunday: Two British security guards were killed on the outskirts of Basra yesterday when a British consulate convoy was hit by a roadside bomb. The attack was the latest in a series of sophisticated strikes threatening to disrupt Britain's plans to reduce its troop presence in southern Iraq.
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Saturday, 30 July 2005 |
 New York Times: Donald H. Rumsfeld, the defense secretary, delivered a blunt message to Iraqi leaders during a visit here last week: the Iraqis would have to be more aggressive in opposing the "harmful" meddling of Iran in this country's affairs before the Americans could consider regional stability assured and the way clear for the United States forces to go home. |
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Friday, 29 July 2005 |
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Iran Focus: London, Jul. 30 – An officer in Iran’s armed forces and an Iranian soldier were arrested together close to the southern Iraq city of Basra early Thursday morning, a London-based Arabic daily wrote in its Friday edition. “Border guards detained on Thursday an Iranian officer and a soldier on Iraqi soil 30 kilometres northeast of Basra, one of the biggest southern cities of this country”, Ash-Sharq Al-Awsat wrote, quoting a commander in Iraq’s border patrol. |
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Friday, 29 July 2005 |
 Iran Focus: Baghdad, Jul. 30 – Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said he had complained to Iranian leaders in a recent visit to Tehran that Iran continued to meddle in the affairs of its neighbour. Speaking on Al-Iraqiya television on Thursday night, Zebari said, “I recently visited Iran with Prime Minister [Ibrahim al-Jaafari">, where we discussed these issues with Iranian officials. |
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Friday, 29 July 2005 |
 Iran Focus: Iran, Tehran, Jul. 29 – Iran’s state television reported last of the arrest of two Iranians in Iraq who were
found smuggling illegal drugs. The state-controlled television station Shabake-2 said that agents of Iraq’s security forces had arrested two Iranians along with an Iraqi for smuggling illegal drugs. |
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Monday, 18 July 2005 |
 AFP: Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari Monday that US troops were harming his country, in a reminder of Tehran's opposition to the foreign military presence in its former foe. It was the first time that US military support for Jaafari's government had been brought up since his arrival on Saturday amid clear efforts by both Iran and Iraq to turn the page on their devastating 1980-88 war. |
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Friday, 15 July 2005 |
 The Washington Times: The Iraqi government, frustrated with the slow pace of reconstruction, is increasingly turning to Iran for investment, refined oil products, electricity and other needs. Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari is to lead a top-level delegation to Iran today to boost security and economic relations between the two Shi'ite-majority nations. |
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Friday, 15 July 2005 |
 The Times: Baghdad's increasingly close ties with Tehran — accused by Washington of “interference” in Iraq’s internal affairs — will receive an important boost today when Ibrahim al-Jaafari, Iraq’s interim Prime Minister, leads a high-level delegation to Iran. The visit by the conservative religious Shia leader and seven of his senior ministers is aimed at boosting trade and collaboration on water resources, as well as border security and military co-operation. |
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Wednesday, 13 July 2005 |
AFP: The United States said Wednesday that Iran should not exploit its improving ties with Iraq to interfere in the affairs of
the fledgling government in Baghdad. Zalmay Khalilzad, about to take up his post as the new US ambassador to Iraq, said however, that Washington did want the once warring neighbours to get along. |
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Tuesday, 12 July 2005 |
 United Press International: Iraqi Defense Minister Sadoun Dulaimi has denied part of an agreement with Iran struck last week includes assistance in training the country's new military.
At a Baghdad news conference, Dulaimi denied Iranian Defense Minister Adm. Ali Shamkhani's claim Iran would provide training as part of a five-point memorandum of understanding. |
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Friday, 08 July 2005 |
 Iran Focus: Baghdad, Jul. 08 – A secret agent’s bid to assassinate an Iranian Kurdish dissident based in neighbouring Iraq was thwarted, according to a statement issued today by the group, the National Islamic Organisation of Iranian Kurdistan (KHABAT). “On June 13, a terrorist attempt on the life of Kak-Baba Sheikh Hosseini, a member of KHABAT’s political bureau, was neutralised”, the statement read. |
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Wednesday, 06 July 2005 |
 Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jul. 07 – Iraqi Defence Minister Sa’adun al-Dulaimi, in a joint press conference with Iranian Defence Minister Ali Shamkhani, announced today that the main Iranian opposition group Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK) could continue to remain at its base on Iraqi soil, despite pressure from Tehran which seeks to have members of the group extradited. |
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