Alwaght- Iran and Iraq plan to hold joint military drills within the next few days, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Brigadier General Massoud Jazayeri announced.
Brigadier General Jazayeri has been quoted by Iranian media as saying that the commanders of Iran’s Armed Forces held a meeting on Saturday chaired by Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Baqeri. In the session, the territorial integrity of Iraq and the illegality of the independence referendum in northern Iraq were highlighted, he said.
The commander added that necessary decisions were taken to establish security along the common borders and to receive forces of Iraq’s central government deployed to border terminals.
It was also agreed that the Iranian armed forces and some units of the Iraqi army hold war games along the common border in coming days, he went on to say.
He added that the meeting was “in line with the declared policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran to help maintain Iraq’s solidarity and territorial integrity and following a request by the central Iraqi government for cooperation with the Islamic Republic of Iran on the establishment of the central government’s authority on the two countries’ border terminals.”
Jazayeri emphasized that participants at the meeting once again stressed the importance of safeguarding Iraq’s territorial integrity and voiced their opposition to the “illegal” referendum held in the northern Kurdistan region.
They also adopted the “necessary decisions to establish security along borders and receive forces of the Iraqi central government to be deployed at border posts,” he added.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq defied international and regional opposition and held a non-binding referendum on September 25 on secession from the central government in Baghdad.
Neighboring states especially Iran and Turkey have warned that the plebiscite would compound the problems of the country, which is already busy with counterterrorism operations against ISIS.
