Baku, Azerbaijan, March 31
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham has rejected claims about Iran 's military aids to Yemeni Shiites.
Allegations about dispatching weapons to Yemen by Iran are "fictitious and sheer lies," Afkham said.
She further said that the claims can not justify the Saudi Arabia-led coalition's military attacks on Yemen , Iran 's official IRNA news agency reported March 31.
An international military operation kicked off on March 26 in Yemen against Iran-backed Ansarullah group, with involvement of the armed forces of a number of Arab states led by Saudi Arabia .
The White House on March 26 expressed concern about Iran 's alleged role in stoking violence in Yemen .
Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi managed to escape Sanaa and house arrest at the hands of the Shiite rebels on Feb. 21. Houthi Shiite rebels have taken control of several cities and are assaulting the port of Aden , where Hadi had been based before fleeing to Riyadh .
While commenting about the Iranian dispached aids to Yemen Afkham said that the two parties have civil aviation agreement and Tehran has sent humanitarian aids and medicine to the country using its civil flights.
The aids were handed over to Yemen 's Red Crescent Society, she underlined.
The Islamic Republic has sent five aid cargo shipments to Yemen so far.
The first Iranian flight landed in Sanaa on March 1, a day after officials from the Shia-controlled city signed an aviation agreement with Tehran .
Senior political and military officials in Tehran confirm that the country's influence is spreading in Yemen .
Last December, Deputy Commander of Iran 's IRGC, Hussein Salami said that the Yemeni Ansarullah group moves in accordance with the Islamic Revolution (1979) within Iran 's geopolitical space. In his similar statements, Iran 's former foreign minister, Ali Akbar Velayati said mid-December that the Islamic Republic's current influence spreads from Yemen to Lebanon .
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