US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has accused Iran of setting up a base for al-Qa’ida, opening a new front in the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” offensive against Tehran.
Mr Pompeo used a speech in Washington to outline what he said was new intelligence on the long and complex relationship between Iran and al-Qa’ida’s leaders, several of whom are known to be based inside the country.
He said the new axis developing was a “massive force for evil” in the world.
“Iran is the new Afghanistan as the key geographic hub for al-Qaeda,” Mr Pompeo said. “Iran has given a new operational headquarters to the network.”
He said the situation was worse than in Afghanistan at the time of the September 11 attacks in 2001, when the US was able to use targeted strikes to weaken al-Qa’ida. “Now these thugs are buried deep inside Iran,” he said.
Mr Pompeo has led President Donald Trump’s hardline response to Iran, championing the reimposition of sanctions and the US’s withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear deal. The accusation over the regime’s ties to al-Qa’ida is another challenge to the incoming Biden administration, which has promised to renew the deal.
The speech came 36 hours after Mr Pompeo designated the Iran-supported Houthi rebel movement in Yemen a “foreign terrorist organisation”.
Read the article by Richard Spencer in The Australian.