Iran intelligence behind killing of Iraqi pilots – report

Iran Focus London, Jun. 10 – Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) has heavily infiltrated Iraq’s security apparatus and government branches and is behind a wave of killings of former Iraqi air force pilots, a prominent Arab daily wrote on Thursday.

The daily Azzaman, which is published both in Baghdad and London, quoted Iraqi intelligence sources as saying that there was a “spy war” currently taking place in Iraq.

The most active foreign intelligence apparatus active in Iraq after the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency and the Pentagon’s counter-intelligence force is the Iranian MOIS, the report said.

“The activities of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence are not limited to intelligence gathering, rather it has infiltrated all of Iraq’s security organs and civilian departments”, it said.

The MOIS is paying its mercenaries the equivalent of $50,000 for the killing of each Iraqi pilot that participated in the bombing of Iranian targets during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, it said, adding that until now more than 100 pilots had been killed and twice as many forced to flee Iraq.