Iranian Rebels Occupy Town Near Iraq

Iranian Rebels Occupy Town Near Iraq
New York Times
June 20, 1988

Associated Press
MEHRAN, Iran, June 19 - Troops of an Iranian rebel movement seeking to topple the regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini captured this town on the Iraqi border today. Iran asserted that Iraqi Army units had attacked Mehran, using chemical weapons ''on a large scale.''

The town, which is now largely in ruins from earlier battles between the Iranian and Iraqi armies, was filled with cheering soldiers of the National Liberation Army, the fighting force of the People's Mujahedeen.

Mehran, which is situated on the central front about 100 miles east of Baghdad, has changed hands four times since the outbreak of the Iran-Iraq war in September 1980.

Today, there was no indication of a major battle in the town - no bodies, no wounded, no destroyed vehicles or fires.

Leaders of the Mujahedeen, an Islamic socialist group, said that most of the fighting took place in foothills north and south of the town, areas dominated by artillery, and that the offensive pushed 12 miles into Iran at its deepest point.

A press officer at Mujahedeen headquarters in Baghdad said that his group ''liberated'' Mehran in a major offensive that started Saturday night.

The Mujahedeen leader, Massoud Rajavi, said in a statement that the capture of Mehran this morning ''is a great victory and a basic step toward the overthrow of Khomeini's oppressive regime.''

Without giving detailed figures, the statement added that ''thousands of enemy troops under Khomeini's command have either been killed, wounded or captured.''

Mujahedeen leaders in Mehran said 1,400 soldiers of the Iranian Government had been taken prisoner. They said that 48 of their fighters were known to have been killed but that casualty figures were incomplete.

A report by the official Iranian press agency said that ''a large number of Iranian Moslem combatants were martyred and injured when Iraqi warplanes chemically bombed the Changuleh region east of Mehran.

''Earlier in the day, Iraqi warplanes had chemically bombed the town of Mehran,'' it added.

The agency said Iranian special units had been dispatched to ''neutralize the chemical weapons, using special techniques'' and that hundreds of Iraqis were killed in fighting near the town.

It also reported that Iranian planes flew five bombing missions against Iraqi positions in the Mehran area.

Iraq denied that its forces were involved in the attack on Mehran or that chemical weapons were used.

Iranian charges that chemical weapons had been used in Mehran are ''nothing more than a pretext to explain away a new military setback,'' said Latif Nusayif Jasim, Iraq's Information Minister.

''The attack was mounted by forces of the National Liberation Army, which have no chemical weapons in their possession,'' Mr. Jasim said in a statement carried by the Iraqi press agency.

The Mujahedeen said the drive, code-named Forty Stars, was the largest operation undertaken by its forces and involved 22 brigades of combat and support troops and covered a front 30 miles wide. Their statement did not say how many troops are in each brigade or give an overall figure for the number of fighters involved.

Supported by Iraq, the Mujahedeen army has been playing a small but growing role in the war.