BAGHDAD (Dispatches) – U.S. occupation forces have used dozens of tanker trucks to smuggle crude oil from Syria’s northeastern province of Hasakah to bases in neighboring Iraq.
Syria’s official news agency SANA, citing local sources in the town of Ya’rubiyah, reported that 45 tankers, laden with stolen oil, rumbled through the illegal Mahmoudiya border crossing on Saturday, and headed towards Iraqi territories.
On Thursday, Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council of the Russian Parliament Konstantin Kosachev said the presence of U.S. military forces in Syria lacks legal justification. He said the deployment amounts to occupation of the territories of a member state of the United Nations.
“Americans have expropriated Syrian lands, and are plundering the country’s natural wealth for the sake of their own military, political and commercial objectives,” the senior Russian lawmaker told SANA in an exclusive interview in Moscow.
He said while the United Nations – under pressure from the United States – rushes to hold meetings on the situation in the war-battered Arab nation, it falls short of dealing with Washington’s intervention in the domestic affairs of other countries.
Kosachev said the United Nations does not carry out its duties and does not work hard enough to maintain peace and security across the globe, or at least in Syria.
The U.S. military has stationed forces and equipment in northeastern Syria, with the Pentagon claiming the deployment is aimed at preventing the oilfields in the area from falling into the hands of Daesh terrorists.
Damascus, however, maintains the deployment is meant to plunder the rich mineral resources.
Meanwhile, a senior Iraqi politician says the United States supports six armed terrorist groups and organizations operating near Iraq’s border with Iran.
Jabbar Odeh, one of the leaders of Iraq’s Coordination Framework Alliance, was cited by al-Maloumah news agency as making the statement in an interview on Saturday night.
“The U.S. foreign policy is based on creating sedition and international conflicts and disputes, because Washington is the heir and follower of the British policy, which is the policy of divide and rule,” Odeh said.
Pointing to the various kinds of support the United States provides to the groups near the border in the Kurdistan region, the Iraqi politician said Washington is using the terrorist groups as “leverage” to turn the area into a scene of regional conflict.
“We consider the presence and activity of these groups around the Iraqi borders with neighboring countries as illegal since Iraq’s Constitution has emphasized the prohibition of any activity against neighboring countries bordering Iraq,” Odeh said.
“Through the financial support of armed groups, the United States is jeopardizing the security of the Iraqi Kurdistan region and pushing the region towards a dangerous direction.”
Odeh said the terrorist groups, which are hiding in the heights of the Kurdistan region of Iraq, are “tools” at the disposal of the American intelligence services.