US State Dept: Iran interferes in Iraq, other countries to ‘foment chaos’

On the 40th anniversary of the US Embassy takeover in Tehran and the 444-day hostage crisis that followed, the US State Department spokeswoman said that Iran is interfering in Iraq and other countries “to foment chaos in the Middle East,” adding that Washington was not surprised by Tehran’s attempts to suppress the demonstrations.

In an interview with Al Arabiya, the spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said on Monday that the United States is “committed to seeing peace and democracy in Iraq.”

Pointing to Iran’s interference in the region, she said “For anyone that pays attention to Iran, it’s not at all shocking when you hear these reports instead it just exemplifies a pattern of behavior that you see by the Iranian regime. Whether it is Iraq, whether it is Yemen, whether it is Lebanon, whether it is Syria, I mean North Africa, you could go through the list of countries where Iran as the largest state sponsor of terrorism uses these proxies...to foment chaos in the Middle East.”

“It is time for the peoples of the Middle East to stand up against this regime,” she said.

Describing the seizure of the US diplomatic compound in Tehran in 1979, Ortagus said “This is one of the darker periods in State Department history.”

“Today the Secretary of State will be honoring the hostages and their families,” said Ortagus.

She called upon the Iranian regime “to release these American hostages, to release those missing and wrongfully detained, then we continue to work behind the scenes.”

“We will go to any lengths, no matter how much time has passed, to get our Americans back home,” she said.