UAE Dismisses Iran’s Attack Allegations
Tehran summons European diplomats over rebel contacts
dubai — A senior UAE official denied on Sunday Iranian allegations alluding to the involvement of the UAE in an attack on a military parade in southwestern Iran.
The “formal incitement against the UAE from within Iran is unfortunate, and has escalated after the Ahvaz attack,” said Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Dr Anwar Mohammed Gargash in a tweet. “The UAE’s historical position against terrorism and violence is clear and Tehran’s allegations are baseless.”
Iran’s Foreign Ministry earlier summoned the UAE charge d’affaires over comments made about the bloody fusillade at the military parade, state-run PressTV said. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Sunday pointed blame at Arab separatists for the deadly attack and accused an unnamed US-backed Gulf state of supporting them.
Tehran also summoned diplomats from Denmark, the Netherlands and Britain for allegedly hosting members of the group suspected of links to Saturday’s attack that killed at least 29 people.
Officials and an eyewitness said the four gunmen who carried out the attack were clad in Iranian military uniforms and had sprayed the crowd with gunfire using weapons they had stashed in a nearby park.
The Daesh militant group claimed responsibility for the rare assault. But Iranian authorities see an Arab separatist movement, the Ahwazi Democratic Popular Front (ADPF) or Al Ahwazi, as the main suspect. —
The UAE’s historical position against terrorism and violence is clear and Tehran’s allegations are baseless Dr Anwar Mohammed Gargash
@AnwarGargash
basra — Hajar Youssif was on her daily commute to work, staring at her phone and flicking through her Instagram account when she looked up to find herself in an unusual location. The taxi driver had turned into an alley.
When she questioned the driver, he sped up.
“I started to feel uneasy and knew that something bad was going to happen,” said the 24-yearold office administrator, who had taken part in protests over lack of clean water, frequent power cuts and soaring unemployment in her hometown of Basra, Iraq’s oil capital and main port. She yelled and tried to open the door, but the driver had locked it. The taxi swerved into a courtyard where three masked men were waiting.
“They immediately told me, ‘We’ll teach you a lesson. Let it be a warning to other protesters’,” Youssif said in an interview several days after the incident.
The men slapped and beat her and pulled off her headscarf, she said. “At the end, they grabbed me by my hair and warned me not to take part in the protests before blindfolding me and dumping me on the streets,” she said, her cheeks still bruised.
Youssif believes the attack was part of what she and other activists describe as a campaign of intimidation and arbitrary detentions by powerful Iranian-backed militias and political groups that control Basra, a city of more than 2 million people in southern Iraq’s Shia heartland. Angry Basra residents have repeatedly taken to the streets in recent weeks to protest failing government services, including water contamination that sent thousands to hospitals.
Earlier this month, protests turned violent when demonstrators attacked and torched government offices, the headquarters of the Iranian-backed militias and Iran’s consulate in Basra — in a show of anger over what many residents perceive as Iran’s outsized control over local affairs. The events in Basra reflect the growing influence of the militias, which played a major role in retaking Iraqi territory from Daesh militants.
Shortly after Daesh militants captured much of northern and western Iraq in 2014, tens of thousands of men answered a call-toarms by the top cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani.
Many volunteers were members of Iran-backed militias active since the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, while others formed new groups.
These fighters are credited with helping government forces defeat the extremists. But during the war, the militiamen were also accused by rights groups of abuses against the Sunnis, including killings, torture and destruction of homes.
Buoyed by victory against Daesh, some of the most feared militias took part in the May national elections and their list — Fatah — won 48 seats in the 329-seat parliament. Fatah and other factions formed a wider Iran-backed coalition in parliament earlier this month and will likely be tasked with forming the new government.
In Basra, some alleged the militias were working with local authorities to quell the protests — a charge denied by Bassem Al Khafaji, head of Sayyed Al Shuhada, one of several Basra militias. He said threats and intimidation of protesters were “individual acts,” but not the result of a central directive.
“Our order for all the factions in Basra ... is not to confront the protesters who burned down the offices of the militias,” Al Khafaji said, arguing that the militias are trying to prevent more bloodshed.
He accused infiltrators of turning the protests violent and said the saboteurs must be dealt with by the security agencies. Some militia leaders accused protesters of colluding with the US, which has long worked to curb Iranian influence in Iraq.
Activist Naqeeb Al Luaibi said he has been able to track only 30 protesters detained by the security agencies. Mahdi Salah Hassan, 26, said he was arrested by security forces from a protest tent in early August. He said he was handcuffed, blindfolded and initially held in a
room with 33 other protesters.
During three days of violent interrogation, Hassan said he was slapped on the face, hit with a cable on his feet and back and hung by the arms from the ceiling. Youssif, who wore white scrubs during the protests as a volunteer medic, said the beating left her shaken
and that threats continue, but she won’t be deterred. “I’m taking to the streets for the sake of my town Basra, to get public services and to get rid of those militias and political parties,” she said. “I’m not afraid of them. These militias will not deter me from going out until we change our life.” —
I’m taking to the streets for the sake of my town Basra, to get public services and to get rid of those militias and political parties. I’m not afraid of them. These militias will not deter me from going out until we change our life
Hajar Youssif, Iraqi activist and volunteer medic