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US troops detain Iranian 'businessman' in
Iraqi Kurdistan region
20.9.2007
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September
20, 2007
Sulaimaniyah, Kurdistan region 'Iraq', -- US
forces arrested an Iranian businessman on Thursday
at a hotel in Sulaimaniyah, a large Kurdish city in
Kurdistan 'northern Iraq', a regional government
official said.
He is the latest Iranian national to be detained in
Iraq by the US military, which accuses Iran of
helping fund and arm Shiite militia groups in the
country's bloody sectarian conflict.
The businessman, identified only as Farhadi, was
detained at around 4.00 am (midnight GMT) after US
troops raided the Sulaimaniyah Palace hotel, said a
spokesman for government of the largely autonomous
region of Kurdistan.
The businessman was a member of an Iranian
commercial delegation visiting Sulaimaniyah, said
the spokesman, Jamal Abdullah.
"American troops raided the Sulaimaniyah Palace
hotel early in the morning and arrested a man known
as Farhadi. He was a member of a commercial
delegation from the Iranian province of Kermanshah,"
Abdullah said.
US military spokesman Major Winfield Danielson said
he could not immediately comment on the reported
detention.
There was no immediate comment from Tehran.
Late last month, US forces briefly detained a group
of Iranians, including two diplomats, from a Baghdad
hotel in what the military later said was a
"regrettable incident."
Tehran issued a protest over what it called the
"unjustifiable" detention of the Iranians, who were
taken by US troops from a hotel in blindfolds and
handcuffs after their convoy was stopped at a nearby
checkpoint.
Thursday's arrest is the third such action by US
troops since January, when five Iranians working in
Kurdistan capital of Erbil were seized for allegedly
aiding the anti-American insurgency. They are still
in US military custody.
It comes amid mounting tension between the United
States and Iran, with Washington accusing Tehran of
stoking tensions in Iraq and of covertly developing
a nuclear weapon.
Iran denies both charges, saying the presence of US
troops is the main cause of violence in Iraq and
that its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes
only.
Amid a mounting war of words, Iran angered
Washington further when it warned on Wednesday that
it could bomb Israel if it was attacked by the
Jewish state.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is travelling
to New York on Sunday and will give a speech at the
UN General Assembly on Tuesday, the same day that US
President George W. Bush is scheduled to speak.
AFP
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