RNA - "Today, the US policy against us is based on maximum pressure and it means that the Americans want to deprive the Iranians of oxygen and water if they can," General Hatami said, addressing a ceremony in Tehran on Sunday.
He referred to the US ban on Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif's meeting with Tehran's envoy to the UN Majid Takht-e Ravanchi at a hospital in New York, and said, "This shows that the Americans want to deprive us of everything."
"Resistance will make us immune in a way that it will turn the enemy's maximum pressure into maximum appeal and begging," General Hatami said.
Elsewhere, he warned enemies that Iran will give a crushing response to any aggressive move against the country.
American authorities forbade Zarif from visiting a New York hospital to see Takht-e Ravanchi, who is under cancer treatment.
The US State Department said it would allow the hospital travel request only if Iran released one of the US citizens claimed to be "wrongfully detained" in Iran.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Seyed Abbas Araqchi lashed out at Washington for inhumanly preventing Zarif from paying visit to Takht-e Ravanchi.
In a message released on his Instagram page on Saturday, Araqchi criticized the US inhuman act to prevent Zarif from visiting Takht-e Ravanchi at hospital.
Araqchi expressed regret for the US administration over holding humanitarian issues hostage for political aims.
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