A dissident Libyan group has been expelled from Iran after last week’s revelation in the Telegraph that it was being trained by the Revolutionary Guards to carry out attacks against Col Muammar Gaddafi’s regime. The Iranians harboured the Libyans as a bargaining chip to prevent Tripoli revealing details about Iran’s clandestine attempts to build an atom bomb. However, after last week’s report that the Libyans were receiving training in terrorist techniques at a secret Revolutionary Guards base in southern Iran, the group was asked to leave the country. A spokesman for the Libyan Islamic Combat Group’s "political bureau" told the London-based Arabic newspaper al-Hayat that it had been "coerced" into leaving Iran. He did not say where the dissidents would be based in future, but said that several commanders had been arrested since leaving Iran.
| I'd guess they're going to be "based" either in Libya or just across Libya's borders... |
Although the Iranians have always denied harbouring al-Qaeda terrorists, the spokesman confirmed that several of the group’s commanders had fled to Iran after the war in Afghanistan in 2001. Iran’s growing concern at the possibility that the Libyans might provide IAEA inspectors with details of its nuclear project resulted in Massoud Jazairi, the Revolutionary Guards’ official spokesman, making a rare public statement last week in which he stressed Iran’s high regard for Col Gaddafi’s regime. "While there are occasionally differences between the two countries regarding various issues, we would not let them harm our fraternal and friendly relations," he said.
| "Not if the trail leads back to us, anyway." |
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