Amid reports that Iran and Hezbollah will lead a counter-attack in the case of a Syrian intervention, Iran's new foreign minister, Javad Zarif, visited Iraq on Sunday to discuss the rising tensions in the region, Reuters reported.
Both Iran, the chief backer of the Syrian regime, and Iraq have both opposed the idea of a U.S.-led attack on the Syrian regime in response to recent chemical weapons use within Syria.
The bloody fighting in Syria has increasingly become an international sectarian affair as Sunni and Shi'ite terrorists from the region have reportedly crossed into Syria to fight on opposite sides of the conflict.
"Our negotiations in Baghdad will tackle bilateral issues and the dangerous situation and circumstances in the region," Zarif said after landing in Baghdad for his first official trip abroad since taking office.
The Iranian FM was received by his Iraqi counterpart, Hoshyar Zebari, and will be expected to meet Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki later in the day.
As U.S. President Obama recently began a round of media interviews aimed at boosting support for a military strike in Syria, The Wall Street Journalclaimed that a senior Iranian official had instructed Shi'ite "militants in Iraq" to attack the U.S. embassy and other American interests in Baghdad in the event that an actual strike in Syria.
However, Alireza Miryousefi, the spokesman for Iran's U.N. mission in New York, dismissed the allegations as "baseless" and relayed that "one should remember that reliance on such intelligence reports from anonymous US officials will lead to another disaster similar to the Iraq tragedy," quoted by Iran's Press TV.