NEW YORK: The United States missed a “golden opportunity” to improve relations with Iran over the past year as the two nations increased contacts both publicly and behind the scenes during the ‘war on terrorism’ in Afghanistan, Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.

Noting Tehran’s cooperation in brokering a post-Taliban government in Afghanistan and its quiet assistance in tracking Al Qaeda operatives passing through Iran, Kharrazi said his government was “shocked” when President Bush labelled Iran one of three nations in an “axis of evil” during his State of the Union address in January.

“Everyone was thinking that it was (moving) on a positive course. ... We had very good cooperation on Afghanistan with the United States. Despite these positive moves and our constructive role, look how they responded. That was a shock for everyone. This does not produce trust, but mistrust,” he said.

“It was a golden opportunity for the US administration to change the course and develop better relations, but they failed.”

Bush’s condemnation of the Iranian government reflected several US concerns about Iran’s support for Hamas and Islamic Jihad, two Palestinian groups that have sponsored suicide bombs against Israel, as well as for Lebanon’s Hezbollah, according to US officials. Washington also charges that Iran is working on its own weapons of mass destruction, despite vehement denials from Iran and trips by nuclear and chemical weapons inspectors to Tehran.

Iran’s experience in playing a “positive” role in Afghanistan has made Tehran wary of what position to take if the United States should eventually engage militarily across an even more important Iranian border with Iraq, Kharrazi said.

Since Iraq used chemical weapons against Iran during their 1980-88 war, Kharrazi said, Tehran shares US concern about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. But Iran is also deeply worried about the potential spillover-from political instability in the region to a mass influx of refugees across the border-in the event of a US military action against Baghdad.

Iran also is uncomfortable with the use of force to change the regime in Baghdad and supports other options.

“The one thing (on which) we certainly differ with the United States is using force to change the government of another country. This is up to the people of Iraq to decide their future government,” said Kharrazi, who served as Iran’s UN ambassador from 1989 to 1997.

At the same time, however, Kharrazi indicated that Iran would accept the use of force as a “reality” if a new UN resolution authorizes military action against the regime of President Saddam Hussein.

Kharrazi also said that Iraqis have the right to demand and fight for greater freedom, and he believes that the majority of Iraqis want a more representative government.

Tehran allows at least three of the six major Iraqi opposition groups supported by the United States — the Iraqi National Congress, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan-to have major offices in Iran. In an exemption from its economic sanctions on Iran, Washington pays for the office of the Iraqi National Congress in Tehran.

But in the meantime, Iran will continue to have diplomatic ties with Iraq and engage in a dialogue, particularly to resolve the many issues lingering 14 years after the end of its war with Iraq.—Dawn/LAT-W.P News Service (c) The Washington Post.