Representative of Ayatollah Khamenei in Iraq:

Iraqis liberated Iraq from Saddam, not the US

Rasa – Ayatollah Asefi, in response to the claims that the Americans liberated Iraq in 2003, stated the Americans invaded Iraq with the intention of full domination over the country but due to fierce opposition by the Islamic Resistance, they had to leave the country in an infamous defeat.

News ID: 2429

Date: 30 April 2015 - 18:57

RNA – Ayatollah Mohammad-Mahdi Asefi, the representative of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, has harshly criticized the claims that the United States played a major role in the liberation of Iraq from Saddam Hussein, saying that Iraqi people liberated Iraq through patience, perseverance and endurance achieved freedom.

“Some people claim that Iraq was liberated by the US and the Iraqi people owe them. I was hurt by this claim. To these people I say if this is true, the Sha’ban Intifada [1991 uprising] was a golden opportunity for the US to overthrow the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and liberate Iraq,” he said in a statement.

His Eminence added that the Americans were completed opposed to the Sha’ban Intifada and permitted the Ba’thist regime to use military aircraft and helicopters to destroy the Iraqi peoples’ revolution because the liberation of Iraq was not their concern or aim. Rather, the Americans sought to keep someone in power who they could control.

Ayatollah Asefi said that the liberation of Iraqi was never a part of the American political and military project during their 2003 invasion. The Americans previously thought that Saddam would able to destroy the Islamic Resistance in Iraq and also thought that after invading the country, they could take power in Iraq and influence its political, military and economic systems to their advantage. It was a fatal mistake, and a great illusion that the Americans fell into.

Ayatollah Khamenei’s representative in Iraq added that after the collapse of the Ba’thist regime in Iraq, the Americans encountered fierce opposition from the forces of the Islamic Resistance and they lost thousands of their soldiers. They did not expect this. Due to pressure from the families of their soldiers and the victims of a war that benefited only Israel, they were forced were to withdraw from Iraq.

His Eminence stressed that the Iraqi people endured great suffering, hardship and oppression of Iraq to save their country. The great martyr Sayyid Muhammad-Baqir al-Sadr was the founder of the revolution against Saddam’s dictatorship. Iraq was not liberated in 2003 by the hands of the United States. Rather, liberation came when the Iraqi people, due to the fierce opposition by the Islamic resistance forces, forced the Americans to leave the country.

“With all due respect to the author of this article, I believe I have to say that any eulogizing of the US role in the liberation of Iraq is an insult to the Iraqi people and the young people who fought against dictatorship and who destroyed the foundations of the system with their dedication, patience and endurance in the face of torture and dedicated their pure blood for this cause,” he added.

In conclusion, Ayatollah Asefi compared the Americans to robbers who attempted to steal the efforts of the Iraqi nation, its youth and women, but added that God humiliated them and resistance forces succeeded in expelling the invaders.

111/112