Azernews.Az

Sara Rajabova

Iraq should not be influenced by Western anti-Iranian policy, Foreign Ministry's spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said on Tuesday at a press conference in Tehran, ISNA news agency reported.

The search of the Iranair cargo flight was conducted at Baghdad International Airport last weekend.

Mehmanparast said that the search of two Iranian planes over the past month had proved that no weapons were aboard Syria-bound Iranian flights.

On Sunday Iraq has stopped and searched an Iranian flight bound for Syria to check for weapons being shipped to President Bashar al-Assad, but found only humanitarian aid, Press TV reported.

The search was the second carried out by Baghdad since Washington warned Iraq not to allow Iran to ship weapons through its airspace to help Assad in his battle against a 19-month-long revolt.

A Western intelligence report in September showed that Iran has been using civilian aircraft to fly military personnel and large quantities of weapons almost daily through Iraqi airspace to aid President Assad's government in its fight against rebels.

Mehmanparast said that claims of Iran transporting weapons to Syria are baseless, and aim to show that the Western countries have nothing to do with unrests in the region and terrorist groups operating in the area. "It is being done to put its fault on someone else."

Mehmanparast urged Iraq to stay vigilant, and not to change its foreign policy according to Western plans.

Earlier on October 2, Iraq stopped and inspected a Damascus-bound Iranair cargo plane from Tehran upon the request of the US officials, who claimed that Tehran uses Iraq's airspace to send weapons to the Syrian government. No weapons were found in that search, either.

The flight checks illustrate the delicate balancing act Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki faces over Syria where an increasingly sectarian conflict threatens to widen Sunni-Shi'ite Muslim divisions in the Middle East, Reuters reported on Sunday.

Close to Shi'ite power Iran, Maliki has refused to back Sunni Gulf Arab nations calling for Assad to step down. But he must also keep strong ties with Washington which is a key supplier of arms to Iraq's military.

Iraq rejected charges it allows Tehran to ferry military equipment or fighters through Iraq. In September, Baghdad said it would subject Syrian-bound Iranian flights to random checks and refused a North Korean plane permission to fly to Syria across Iraq on suspicion it carried arms.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011 and many people have been killed in the violence.

According to the UN, more than 20,000 people, mostly civilians, have died in Syria since the uprising against the regime of President Assad began some 19 months ago. However, activists say more than 30,000 people have been killed in the uprising. A further 2.5 million Syrians urgently need humanitarian aid, according to UN estimates.