TEHRAN – Ali Akbar Velayati, a top foreign policy adviser to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution, has said neighboring Iraq is a source of pride for the Arab world and Islam.

“We see Iraq as a neighbor and a friendly state. We are proud that there is a party like Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba in Iraq,” Velayati said in a meeting with Iraq’s al-Nujaba Movement spokesman Nasr ash-Shimmari on Monday.

“As long as Iran and Iraq stand by each other and there is the resistance movement, no power can withstand them,” he added, according to IRNA.

Velayati also praised the Iraqi prime minister’s efforts, along with those of the al-Nujaba Movement, to prevent U.S. and Israeli interference in Iraq’s internal affairs. 

He stressed that Tehran and Baghdad will stand by one another to develop much better relations.

Shimmari, for his part, said that no country can use Iraq to attack Iran. “We will use all in our power to stand against such a conspiracy,” he said.

President Barham Salih has also said Iraq will under no circumstances allow the U.S. military to use its bases in the Arab country for an act of aggression against neighboring Iran.

In an interview back in June, Salih stressed that American troops had been invited to Iraq solely for helping Baghdad fight the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group.

It came after U.S. President Donald Trump’s comments in February, when he said he wanted to maintain a U.S. military presence in Iraq to “watch” Iran.

MH/PA