Iran's Top Security Official:

US Seeking to Manage, Not Eradicate ISIL

Rasa - Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani blasted the US claims about fighting the ISIL, and said Washington is only seeking to administer the terrorist group to meet its own interests in the region.

News ID: 432340

Date: 12 September 2017 - 23:56

RNA - "We have repeatedly received documented reports proving that the US-led coalition had been trying to manage the ISIL instead of fighting against it and in cases that the terrorist group's suppression was possible, the US has shown no reaction and even helped it to flee the battlefield," Shamkhani told the Arabic-language al-Vefagh newspaper on Tuesday.

He added that the US has today taken the gesture of fight against the ISIL to cover its supports for the terrorist group and prevent implementation of Hezbollah agreement to evacuate the families of the terrorists from Syria.

"What we have so far seen from the US and its allies is bombing the residential areas, massacre of women and children, targeting the positions of the Syrian army and Iraqi popular forces and some limited ineffective operations which have covered dispatch of logistical aid to the terrorists," Shamkhani said.

In relevant remarks in July, Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani blasted the US and its allies for supporting the terrorist groups, and said that Washington is only pretending to be combating the ISIL.

"At the time when Iraq was being overrun by the ISIL, did the United States make the slightest move in defense of it? Or was it the Iranian nation that rendered aid to the Iraqi nation and Iraqi government?" Larijani asked.

He reiterated that if Iran had not assisted the Iraqi government and nation, Baghdad would have been occupied by the ISIL by now, and said, "It is with the help of Iran that the ISIL is taking its last breath in Iraq and Syria."

Also in the same month, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif urged the US to stop supporting the terrorist groups in the region, and said that Washington's recent approach in Syria will only make the ISIL stronger.

"Another dangerous US escalation in Syria on fake pretext will only serve ISIS, precisely when it’s being wiped out by Iraqi and Syrian people,” Zarif wrote on his Twitter page.

The Iranian foreign minister underlined that the US should join the real war against terrorist groups instead of pursuing policies that strengthen the terrorists.

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