US Efforts to Impair Iran-Iraq Ties Doomed to Failure

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- We do not allow Americans to impair our relations with Iraq, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Mohammad Ali Hosseini stressed here on Thursday after US troops invaded Iran’s consulate general in the Iraqi northern city of Erbil.

Speaking to Iran’s state-run News Network, Hosseini condemned invasion of Iran’s consulate general and arrest of the Iranian diplomats in Erbil as a blatant violation of the international laws and diplomatic rules and norms, and said, “The United States has always pursued the same policy and the illogical arrest of the two Iranian diplomats in Iraq last month was another evidence substantiating the same fact.”

He said that the arrest of the Iranian employees in the Iranian consulate general in Erbil has taken place in pursuit of the same wrong policy of the US in Iraq, and continued, “They are striving to impair the good ties between Iran and Iraq, but we do not allow them to do so and we will follow up on the case merely within the framework of our mutual cooperation with Baghdad.”

The spokesman further claimed the US troops in Iraq responsible for the arrest of the employees of Iran’s consulate general, and said, “We have made different contacts with the Iraqi officials and the required measures are now underway through official and diplomatic channels.”

“We will follow the case through our embassy in Baghdad,” he concluded.