WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has named U.S. diplomat Frank Ricciardone to a new post designed to aid opposition forces within Iraq.

As "special representative for transition in Iraq," Ricciardone is to coordinate the seven opposition groups that the United States says it will support. Albright said he will be helped by military and political advisers with experience in the region.

"We must and will persist in thwarting Iraq's potential for aggression," Albright said. "And the aid of Frank Ricciardone will persist in helping the Iraqi people reintegrate themselves into the world community by freeing themselves from a leader they do not want, do not deserve and never chose."

Albright announced the appointment in a speech at The Center for National Policy, a Washington think tank she once led.

Ricciardone has served as the U.S. deputy chief of mission in Ankara, Turkey -- an important listening post for events in the Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.

His appointment is part of the a long-term U.S. strategy of seeking political change in Baghdad rather than containing the Baath Party government of Saddam Hussein indefinitely.

Since the end of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the United States and its allies have maintained economic sanctions on Iraq and occasionally resorted to military force to punish Hussein for violations of the war's cease-fire terms.

Ricciardone's job was established by the Iraqi Liberation Act, which Congress passed in 1998. The measure devotes up to $97 million in military aid to Iraqi opposition groups.

On Tuesday, Clinton named seven such groups eligible for the U.S. assistance.

But one -- Iraq's main Shiite Muslim opposition group -- rejected that aid offer on Thursday.

"Our answer is thank you but no thank you," said Hamid al-Bayati, a representative of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which is based in Iran.

"Such methods ruin the image of the Iraqi opposition, appearing to receive aid from the West and the United States. We will not take this aid," he said.

Reuters contributed to this report.