U.S. 'supports borderline terrorists against Iran'

(AFP) Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, seen here in September 2008 As the White House continues to claim that it seeks "change", the Leader of the Islamic Revolution asserts that the US harbors terrorists on Iran's western borders. Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, who is on an 8-day tour in the western Iranian province of Kordestan, spoke of enemy plans to destabilize the Iranian government from behind the western borders. "The United States is promoting terrorism behind [Iran's] western frontiers... They [the US government] directly finance operations and organize terrorist movements to undermine the Islamic Republic," Ayatollah Khamenei said on Tuesday. "We have information that Americans have evil plans for Kordestan... They're not planning to defend the rights of the Kurdish people but their aim is to dominate the Kurds and sow seeds of discord among them," the Leader said. Ayatollah Khamenei's remarks on terrorist plots along the western borders comes after a revelation by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh in 2008 that US congressional leaders had secretly agreed to a $400-million funding request by then president George W. Bush for a major escalation in covert operations against the Iranian government. According to Hersh, actions permitted under the secret directive include "the assassination of targeted officials" as well as operations across an extensive geographic area. The White House has refused to comment on the Hersh report. "Our Kurdish friends on the other side of the border have told us that US officers are paying the Kurdish youth on the Qandil hills in exchange for information," the Leader continued. "They pay money to create mercenaries. That is below the dignity of Kurdish youth," Ayatollah Khamenei added. Iran's bordering areas with Iraq have witnessed deadly clashes between Iranian armed forces and the Kurdish separatists of the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) -- an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). The outlawed group has been staging cross-border attacks in Iran since 2004 on behalf of "Iranian Kurdish interests" in an attempt to establish an independent Kurdish state. An April 10, 2006 report by Hersh revealed that US troops were establishing contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups in Iran such as the PJAK rebels. Later in November 2006 Hersh wrote that, "Israel and the United States have also been working together in support of a Kurdish resistance group known as the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan. The group has been conducting clandestine cross-border forays into Iran." According to Hersh, Israel has been providing the Kurdish group with "equipment and training." The group has also been given "a list of targets inside Iran of interest to the US."