KUWAIT: Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Al-Jarallah meets Iranian Ambassador to Kuwait Mohammed Irani on Friday. - KUNA

KUWAIT: Kuwait's foreign ministry summoned Iran's ambassador Friday after a high-level Iranian official implicated the state in the US drone attack that killed top general Qasem Soleimani, official news agency KUNA reported. Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Al-Jarallah expressed Kuwait's "amazement" at the claim that one of its air bases had been among those used to carry out the Jan 3 attack, KUNA said.

It said he was referring to a statement by Brigadier-General Amirali Hajizadeh, aerospace commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards. "MQ-9 UAVs (drones) were flying in the region (at the time of the attack) that had mostly taken off from Kuwait's Ali Al-Salem" base, Hajizadeh told Iranian state television Thursday.

Jarallah told the ambassador, Mohammed Irani, that Kuwait had already denied any role in the deadly attack in Baghdad. He said such a claim "risks damaging relations" between Kuwait and Iran. Soleimani had been at the center of power-broking in the region for two decades as chief of Iran's external operations Quds Force of the elite Revolutionary Guards. - Reuters