Iran press/ America: Brian Hook, the US special representative on Iran, repeatedly declined to say if President Donald Trump legally enjoyed the right to attack Iran, echoing the non-committal comments in April before Congress by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
"I'm not a War Powers Act scholar. I can only tell you that everything we would do would be lawful," Hook told a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee.
But pressed by Democratic Representative Brad Sherman on whether Iran was responsible for the deaths of Americans on September 11, 2001, Hook replied, "No."
After Al-Qaeda extremists killed some 3,000 people in 2001, the US Congress authorized then president George W. Bush to go to war in Afghanistan, where the group's leader Osama bin Laden had found shelter.
The authorization has since been cited by administrations to justify operations in countries as diverse as Yemen and the Philippines where Al-Qaeda militants are found to be present.
Pompeo, in his April appearance before a Senate committee,claimed that there was "no doubt" of a connection between Iran and Al-Qaeda, which is militant group created by
Ex-US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has acknowledged that the United States had created and funded Al Qaeda as a terrorist organization in the heyday of the Soviet-Afghan war:
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“Let’s remember here… the people we are fighting today we funded them twenty years ago… and we did it because we were locked in a struggle with the Soviet Union.
“They invaded Afghanistan… and we did not want to see them control Central Asia and we went to work… and it was President Reagan in partnership with Congress led by Democrats who said you know what it sounds like a pretty good idea… let’s deal with the ISI and the Pakistan military and let’s go recruit these mujahideen.
“And great, let them come from Saudi Arabia and other countries, importing their Wahabi brand of Islam so that we can go beat the Soviet Union.
“And guess what … they (Soviets) retreated … they lost billions of dollars and it led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
“So there is a very strong argument which is… it wasn’t a bad investment in terms of Soviet Union but let’s be careful with what we sow… because we will harvest.
“So we then left Pakistan … We said okay fine you deal with the Stingers that we left all over your country… you deal with the mines that are along the border and… by the way we don’t want to have anything to do with you… in fact we’re sanctioning you… So we stopped dealing with the Pakistani military and with ISI and we now are making up for a lot of lost time.”
Tensions have soared in recent days, as IRGC shot down a US RQ-4 spy drone close to the Iranian province of Hormozgan in Persian Gulf Shores early on Thursday.
IRGC shoots down US spy drone in Persian Gulf
"Tehran strongly warns against any 'illegal and aggressive' violation of Iranian airspace and territory by any foreign intruder," he added, stressing: "All the responsibility for such moves lies on the aggressors."
Hook insisted that the Trump administration's "maximum pressure" campaign -- which included pulling out of a denuclearization accord still backed by the Europeans -- was succeeding.
But Hook said Trump was serious in his appeals for negotiations with Iran, which reached the nuclear accord after extensive talks with the administration of his predecessor Barack Obama.
"No one should be uncertain about our desire for peace and our readiness to normalize relations should we reach a comprehensive deal," Hook said.
"We have put the possibility of a much brighter future for Iran on the table and we mean it," he said.
Hook said a future US-Iran accord would focus on four areas -- Tehran's nuclear program, ballistic missiles, support for extremist groups and detention of US citizens.
Iran's leaders have dismissed dialogue with the Trump administration, questioning its sincerity and pointing to US officials' comments gloating over economic difficulties in the country.
Representative Ted Deutch, the Democrat who heads the House subcommittee on the Middle East, said Trump's policy was incoherent and had triggered an escalation from Iran rather than any desired outcome.
"It appears there is no process in place to reassess the assumptions underlying the administration's policies," he said.
"Rather than get Iran back to the negotiating table, the administration's policy is increasing the chance of miscalculation, which then would bring the United States and Iran closer to a military conflict," he said.213/
