The Foreign Ministry has denied the report that Iran and the United States are cooperating to deal with the Islamic State insurgency in Iraq.
“We had previously announced our policy in this regard and the news report is not true,” Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Marzieh Afkham said on Friday evening.
Iran has announced that it is helping the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government in their campaign against Islamic State militants, who have overrun large swathes of land in northern and western Iraq, but it has said there are no Iranian soldiers on the ground in the crisis-hit Arab country.
BBC reported on Friday that a top Iranian commander had been authorized to coordinate military operations with the US and Iraqi and Kurdish forces.
The US State Department also said on the same day that it was not coordinating military action or sharing intelligence with Iran, Fox News reported.
State Department spokesperson Marie Harf repeatedly denied US officials were working with Iran in a military or intelligence capacity, but she said the US was open to “engaging Iranians”.
