LONDON, Oct 15: Iran is willing to set aside reservations about US attacks on Afghanistan and work with Washington in its campaign against terrorism, a senior Iranian official told the Financial Times.

This could include the sharing of intelligence provided the fight against terrorism was led by the United Nations, the paper cited Mohsen Rezai as saying in its Monday edition.

“If the Americans get trapped in the swamp of Afghanistan, they will definitely need Iran,” Rezai, who has close ties to the military, told the Financial Times.

Rezai, who led Iran’s revolutionary guards for 16 years, is currently the secretary general of the nation’s powerful Expediency Council which arbitrates in disputes between the institutions of the Islamic regime.

His comments were the clearest indication yet that Iran might be willing to use an opportunity created by the September 11 attacks on the United States to erase more than 20 years of tension between the two countries since the Iranian revolution, said the paper.

Prospects of closer ties with Iran and a possible easing of US sanctions came as the US-led military campaign in Afghanistan entered its second week. Rezai told the Financial Times that Iran was “the solution to this crisis.

“Although the US is dissatisfied with Iran, it seriously needs Iran’s position,” he said. —AFP