Iranian Military Official Warns of ISIL’s Massive Presence in Afghanistan

“The highest number, nearly 7,000, of ISIL terrorists, are deployed in Afghan territories and they supply their weapons with the Saudi and UAE money, and the Americans have kept them to be used as a pressure leverage against Iran, Russia and China,” Head of Iran’s Army Center for Strategic Studies Brigadier General Ahmad Reza Pourdastan said, addressing a ceremony in the Central city of Khansar on Friday.

He, meantime, underlined Iran’s good intelligence superiority over the ISIL, saying, “Their location is clear to us.”

In relevant remarks last month, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani warned President Ashraf Ghani of ISIL’s relocation to Afghanistan.

“Enemies of the security and tranquility of the region in an organized move are after fomenting insecurity at the shared borders to transfer the defeated ISIL terrorists to Afghanistan and support the spread of Takfiri terrorism in the country to ignite the flames of war, bloodshed and insecurity in the region once again,” Shamkhani said during the meeting in Kabul.

He cautioned that ignoring the threat could end up in re-experiencing the bitter incidents which happened in Iraq and Syria.

Also, last January, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei expressed deep regret over the massacre of the Afghan people in terrorist attacks, blaming the US for the tragedies by transferring the ISIL terrorists to Afghanistan to guarantee its presence in the region.

“The US goal of transferring the ISIL terrorists to Afghanistan is justification of its continued deployment in the region and establishment of security for the Zionist regime,” Ayatollah Khamenei said, addressing the Iranian seminaries in Tehran.

“The same hands which used the ISIL as a tool to oppress and commit crimes against the people in Syria and Iraq by its creation, is today after transferring the ISIL to Afghanistan after sustaining defeat in those regions, and the recent massacres are actually the start of this plot,” he added.

Ayatollah Khamenei said that the US-backed terrorists don’t differentiate between the Shiites and Sunnis, and added, “The US wants this region not to see good days and wants the regional governments and nations to be busy with their own affairs so that they don’t think of opposing the evil agent of arrogant powers, that is Zionism.”

He described the United States’ other goal of creation of insecurity as justification of its presence in the region, and said, “The Americans, themselves, are the main cause for insecurity in Afghanistan and the killings in this region since 20 years ago under the name of religion were carried out, directly or indirectly, by the US agents, and they are now after guaranteeing their presence by fomenting insecurity and attaining their political and economic objectives.”