Former Iranian prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh steps off a plane in late August 1953. He was imprisoned for three years and put under house arrest until his death in 1967.[/caption]The US State Department has blocked the publication of a documentary history of the CIA-backed overthrow of former Iranian prime minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953.
Senior State Department officials decided at a September meeting to delay the release of the document out of concerns that it could adversely affect the current negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program.
The department's historian, Stephen Randolph, said that the volume on US policy in Iran would be withheld "because of ongoing negotiations with Iran," according to the minutes of a September 8, 2014 meeting.
The Central Intelligence Agency has already acknowledged its role in toppling Mosaddegh, citing it a "CIA-assisted coup" on a timeline on its public website.
Earlier in a 2009 speech in Cairo, President Barack Obama said that "in the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically elected Iranian government."
Last year, other classified documents revealed more details about the involvement of US and Britain in the coup dtat.
The US and Britain had the same level of involvement in carrying out the coupe. As much as five million dollars were spent buying support from senior officials, military officers, newspaper editors and thugs to carry out the plot, which was based on an order apparently signed by the US-backed Shah to dismiss Mosaddeq and replace him with General Fazlollah Zahedi, a choice agreed on by the British and Americans.
Mosaddegs overthrow led to the return of Iran's former monarch, Shah Reza Pahlavi, whose regime turned increasingly oppressive until it was toppled by the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
By Press TV
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