Iran will not stand in way of UN-backed war on Iraq

Tehran minister hints at softening opposition

Iran will not stand in the way of a US-led war on Iraq if it has the backing of the United Nations Security Council, the country's foreign minister said yesterday.

Although Iran has been branded by President George Bush as being part of an "axis of evil" that includes Iraq and North Korea, its reformist government can see many benefits from ending the regime of Saddam Hussein from which it suffered chemical attacks during an eight-year war.

Saddam's regime has also crushed the Shia population which comprises up to 70 per cent of Iraq's people. The overwhelming majority of Iranians are Shia.

"We do not support military action but if the United Nations Security council decides to use force against Iraq, that is something else," Iran's foreign minister Kamel Kharrazi said yesterday.

"In that case, the UN and member states have to comply, that will be a fact". But there were also red lines which a Western coalition must not cross, he warned, notably any attempt by Washington to appoint a US military governor for Iraq. That would end in disaster for the region, Mr Kharrazi said. Iran is adamant that whatever government emerges to replace Saddam Hussein must be chosen by the Iraqi people, rather than President Bush.

Any direct US involvement in the running of Iraq could also lead to instability within Iran, it is feared.

The reformist and hugely popular government of Mohammad Khatami is locked in a bruising internal battle with the conservative Islamic clerics, who control many key centres of power, including the military, intelligence services and the judiciary.

The conservatives, under Iran's Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, view the US moves to topple Saddam as part of grander plot to encircle Iran, and to finally attack the Islamic republic itself. They point to the intimate US involvement in the selection and protection of Afghanistan's leader Hamid Karzai, and hostile statements from the Bush administration about Iran as indications that it is soon to become a target.

Iran will not use its military for any UN-authorised attacks on Iraq, the foreign minister said. But it is expected to play a significant military role through its proxy forces. The country has played host to an army of fundamentalist Iraqi exiles for the past 22 years.

These will not be prevented by Tehran from joining in the battle to remove Saddam, Mr Kharrazi said. Between 10,000 and 13,000 exiled soldiers based in Iran intend to be the spearhead of opposition attempts to topple Saddam.

If they moved into Iraq to fight the regime, it would be "their own decision and choice", Mr Kharrazi said. Any attempt at US military rule would fail, he said. "The people of Iraq are very sensitive to foreign interference."

"It's up to the Iraqi people to chose a new government," he said. "Military rule from outside will not be welcomed by the Iraqi people and none of the governments of the region will accept it".

Mr Kharrazi made clear that Iran intends to be closely involved in any post-war settlement with Iraq. While emphasising that Iran has no territorial ambitions on its neighbour and wants the country to remain unified, Tehran has a long shopping list of demands dating from the Iran-Iraq war, that it wants to see fulfilled. "Iran will want to take part in these discussions," Mr Kharrazi said, because its national interest was in having a stable neighbouring country.

It is also seeking billions of dollars in compensation from Iraq for the damage done to the country during the Gulf war. The "imposed war" as it is called in Iran, caused nearly a million casualties and almost brought the Islamic revolution of Ayatollah Khomeini to its knees.

"We have been victimised by the chemical weapons used by Iraq against Iran," Mr Kharrazi said in a pointed reference to the West's justification for future military action should the UN weapons inspectors' mission to Baghdad end in failure.

Iran would also demand that a new government in Baghdad renounce Saddam Hussein's claims on parts of the Shatt al-Arab waterway – the cause of the Iran-Iraq war.

"We have many issues with Iraq," he said, and they all needed to be resolved through peaceful negotiation.

What is unlikely to be peaceful is the treatment Iran intends to give to the Mujhadeen al-Khalq forces, tens of thousands of armed Iranian exiles and sworn enemies of the Islamic Republic being sheltered by Saddam Hussein.