Iran yesterday protested that five nationals arrested by US forces in Iraq were merely consular staff doing their job, amid intensifying US warnings over Tehran's role in its war-torn neighbor.
The detention of the five on suspicion of being agents of the Revolutionary Guards seeking to stir trouble came after US President George W. Bush vowed the military would "seek out and destroy" networks destabilizing Iraq.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is also on a tour of the Middle East aimed at showing up alleged Iranian interference in the region to Washington's allies.
"What they [the arrested five] were doing was consular work. These were official employees who were doing their job according to the rules," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters.
"What the Americans claim is incorrect. They want to create a climate that justifies their illegal action," he added.
Six Iranians were arrested in a night-time swoop by US forces on an office in the Kurdish northern Iraqi city of Arbil on Thursday, one of whom was later released.
The US has said the men had links to Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards and none of them held diplomatic passports.
The arrests came amid continued accusations by US commanders that Tehran is arming militias and inciting anti-US attacks to feed intercommunal bloodletting that is dogging Iraq. Iran vehemently denies the charges.
"We have had a strategy toward Iran, I think, that has been evolving to deal with the serious problems that Iran is causing," Rice said in Israel at the start of her Middle East tour.
Rice warned that further raids were a possibility.
"We've done it a couple of times. We're going to keep doing it," she said.
A statement by the US military in Baghdad said that preliminary results of their investigation "revealed the five detainees are connected to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard -- Qods Force [IRGC-QF]."
The "organization is known for providing funds, weapons, improvised explosive device technology and training to extremist groups attempting to destabilize the government of Iraq and attack coalition forces," it said.
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