(AINA) -- Governments sometimes lie. What is striking about the theocratic regime in Tehran is that it lies constantly. One lie, repeated for weeks now, is that the mullahs are not intervening in Iraqi affairs. But they are doing just that -- big time.

So troubling is Iran's intervention that last week, Iraq's interim President Ghazi al-Yawrr and his neighbor, King Abdullah II of Jordan, most undiplomatically said so. The Iraqi Defense Minister, Hazim al-Sha'lan, went on to dot the i's and cross the t's by saying, "Iran is the most dangerous enemy of Iraq and all Arabs."

Majid Ansari, Iranian vice-president for legal and parliamentary affairs responded by saying, "I believe these people are consciously or unconsciously influenced by the propaganda of the Zionist regime."

Iran's government-run media is disseminating propaganda of its own, which began when U.S. forces captured Baghdad. A survey for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty showed that Iran was the source of 41 of 63 AM/FM/TV broadcasts beamed into Iran. Radio and television broadcasts into Iraq accuse the United States of committing crimes against Iraqi's and of pursuing its hegemonic interests without regard to human life, according to the BBC.

The Voice of Muhajedin radio referred to the "genocide" of American occupation against Iraqi women, children and men. In March, a TV station reported that a bomb set off by insurgents in Baghdad was a US missile exploding.

The Voice of the Mujahedin was quoted saying in early December that, "The first and prime goal of this war is to extend US control and hegemony on Iraq so that it may serve as a launch pad for imperialist enterprises against the Muslim world and the peoples of the region."

Al-Alam TV and Sahar TV are broadcast by Iran into Iraq. All of these stations remind the people of Iraq that the Americans have no respect for humanity or democracy.

The chief instruments of the mullahs' intervention, though, are the Ministry of Information and Security, Iranian intelligence and the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps, known as the Sepah pasdaran. They have set up intelligence networks in Iraqi cities, planned attacks on American targets and supplied funds, weapons, training and safe haven to Iraqi insurgents.

A million or more Iranians have moved into Iraq since the end of Saddam Hussein's regime. Many are undoubtedly pilgrims to Iraq's Shia shrines or simple cross-border traders. But others have received military training. During a bout of insurgence in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, a resident found Iranians outside the door of his house, setting up a mortar position.

The mullahs know that nothing will happen without money. So their operatives have dispersed tens of millions to fund pro-Iranian political parties. One is the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which has a disarmed Badr militia of 10,000, trained and armed in Iran.

Their goal is to get U.S. forces out of Iraq and eventually the whole Gulf region. A step in this direction is strife in Iraq that could produce an Iraqi Hezbollah. The Lebanese Hezbollah has already acted as the Iranian mullahs' go between in transmitting funds from Tehran to Muqtada al-Sadr -- the renegade Shia leader who mounted insurrections against U.S. forces earlier this year.

The mullahs' are trying to conceal their real motive -- a longstanding policy to undermine stability in Iraq, threaten American interests and seek control over the future of the Iraqi people. But Washington won't have it.

In a press conference today, President Bush said the mullahs should heed America's warnings and stay out of the political process. "When I said the other day that I expect these countries to honor the political process in Iraq without meddling, I meant it. And hopefully those governments heard what I said."

But with Washington becoming more entrenched in Iraq by the day, Tehran's fears are waning.

By Derk Kinnane Roelofsma
Alliance For Democracy In Iran