 |
Kuwait Denies Connection with US Air Strikes on Iraq
Kuwait on Sunday denied any connections with the US and British air strikes against military targets in south Baghdad, Iraq, two days ago.
The strikes on Iraqi targets "concern Baghdad and the allied states," said Kuwaiti Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammad Sabah al-Salem al-Sabah.
Kuwait does not interfere in internal affairs of other countries, said Sheikh Mohammad in a statement to the official Kuwait News Agency following the weekly cabinet session.
He was the first Kuwaiti official to comment on the US and British air raids on Iraqi targets on Friday evening, the first in more than two years.
The US said a total of 24 US and British warplanes struck five Iraqi military sites in south Baghdad, using various long- range precision-guided missiles.
Washington has justified the bombing as "a self-defense measure to stem increased threat from Iraqi air defenses to US aircraft patrolling the southern no-fly zone."
The U.S. and Britain imposed two no-fly zones in Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War to protect what they said ethnic Kurds in the north and Shi'ite Muslims in the south from Iraqi government's attacks.
U.S. and British warplanes patrolling the southern no-fly zone are based in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Iraq has accused Kuwait and Saudi Arabia as traitors of the Arabs for providing bases for allied forces in the region.
In This Section
|