In an interview with ABC News, General Raymond Odierno, MNF-I Commander, called the Iranian regime a threat to Iraq’s stability and security that continues a widespread campaign against the security agreement between the US and Iraq. Excerpts of the interview are as below: Q: What about Iran’s involvement? We’ve heard reports that some of these special groups are now going back to Iran for training and are coming back here and that they may be responsible for some of the trouble.
Odierno: Well, Iran continues to meddle inside of Iraq. Clearly they have a tremendous information campaign going on against the strategic agreement between the United States and Iraq. They’re openly criticizing it. So they want to influence the outcome of that. We continue to see some lethal aid. We’re still discovering Iranian-made weapons and munitions that are still inside of Iraq. Although it’s a bit less, we’re still discovering it. And thirdly, we do believe they’re starting to change their tactics a little bit. We believe they are starting to train some of these special groups who have broken off from Jaish al-Mahdi once they’ve started to reconcile, and we believe they’re forming [unintelligible]-like organizations that they want to insert into Iraq for a long term potential to create instability. So clearly they still are active here in Iraq. We would much rather see them act in a much more positive way through economic development, technological development, and have them fully focus on that. That would be a much better way for them to act.
Q: Are they a threat to the stability of Iraq?
Well, I think they are. I mean, I think they could be a positive force if they choose to be. But right now, for the most part, they, in my mind, are creating more instability in Iraq.
Q: With the knowledge of the Iranian government?
Odierno: I would just say the Quds Force is the one that’s running the operations here. People have differing opinions on what the relationship is with the government. But I would say the Quds Force is clearly involved in what’s going on here in Iraq.