Iran drafts reserve as war intensifies along Iraq border

Press, 22 September 1980, Page 6

Iran drafts reserve as war intensifies along Iraq border

NZPA-Reuter Teheran

Iran called up reservists yesterday to bolster regular troops fighting Iraqi forces along almost all of the two countries’ 1200 km common border.

President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, who is command-er-in-chief of the anned forces, ordered the reservists to report for active duty by October 2 to “defend the integrity of the country." It was not immediately known how many of Iran’s estimated 300,000 reservists were affected by the call-up, in which President Bani-Sadr declared that Iran had been “invaded and attacked /by strangers and people devoted to international imperialism.” The order, read over the

State radio, covered all officers and men who completed national service during the Persian year ending on March 20, 1978, just under a year before Iran’s Islamic revolution dealt a heavy blow to the former imperial Army. The call up was seen as partly symbolic, but it also hinted at the damage done to the Shah’s once mighty Army of 285,000 men by the revolution, subsequent purges, and a year of gruelling clashes against the Iraqis and Kurdish autonomist rebels.

A military communique said that ground and air battles raged on Saturday along most of the frontier with Iraq, from Kurdestan province in the north to the disputed Shaft Al-Arab

waterway leading . into the Gulf.

In heavy fighting over the last two weeks, Iraq has seized small strips of border territory. In a visit to border areas last week Mr BaniSadr pledged to recapture it all.

Four days ago, Bagdad tore up a 1975 treaty with Iran on land frontiers and joint control of the Shatt AlArab, which it said should be returned to total Iraqi sovereignty. Officials in . the ports of Abadan and Khorramshahr on the disputed estuary said the situation was unchanged on, the Iranian side. Ships coming to the two ports were still flying the Iranian flag and taking instructions from Iranian authorities, they said.