TEHRAN – The Iranian defense minister say the US is transferring Daesh toAfghanistan to justify its military presence in the Cental Asian countryfollowing heavy blows dealt to the Takfiri terrorist group in Syria andIraq.
Brigadier General Amir Hatami made the remarks in a telephone conversationwith his Afghan counterpart, Tariq Shah Bahrami, on Sunday.
Hatami offered condolences to and expressed sympathy with the Afghanpeople, government and armed forces over multiple terrorist attacks thatkilled and injured many people in the country in recent days.
“Iran has always been concerned about conspiracies hatched byoutsiders against the Afghan people and has for many years done its best toameliorate the suffering of the oppressed people of Afghanistan,” he added.
The Iranian defense minister also stressed that the US created Daesh to useit in Syria and Iraq.
However, he said, “after heavy blows suffered in these two countries, theUS tried to take Dash out of the scene and transfer it to Afghanistan tojustify its presence there through [the group’s] shameless crimes.”
Late last month, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed AliKhamenei issued a similar warning about Washington’s attempt to relocateDaesh from the Middle East to Afghanistan.
During Sunday’s phone call, the Afghan defense minister, for his part,appreciated the expression of sympathy with his countrymen by AyatollahKhamenei as well as the Iranian nation, government and armed forces.
He further hailed cordial relations between Tehran and Kabul throughout thehistory.
Iran and Afghanistan and other neighboring countries should not disregardtheir common enemy and should instead cooperate closely with each other inthe fight against terrorism, he said.
The US and its allies invaded Afghanistan under the guise of the war onterror. Some 17 years on, the local Taliban militant group has only boostedits campaign of violence across the country, targeting both civilians andsecurity forces in bloody assaults.
More recently, Daesh has also taken advantage of the chaos and establisheda foothold in eastern and northern Afghanistan. The Takfiri outfit has alsostepped up its terror attacks in the war-torn country despite the presenceof thousands of foreign troops there.