Iran Condemns US as World’s No. 1 Sponsor of Terror

RNA - “The targeted killing of Lt. Gen. Soleimani — an anti-terror legend — proved to the global public opinion that it is the US government that is the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism,” the ministry said in a statement on Monday.

On January 3, the US assassinated General Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), and a group of their companions in Baghdad. The operation was conducted with the authorization of US President Donald Trump. The US Department of Defense took responsibility for the assassination.

Both commanders enjoyed deep reverence among Muslim nations over their endeavors in eliminating the US-sponsored Daesh Takfiri terrorist group in the region, particularly in Iraq and Syria.

Pointing to an interview that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif had with the German-based Der Spiegel magazine  at the weekend, the statement said, “One of the objectives the US is pursuing in its diplomatic battle with the Islamic Republic of Iran is to depict a belligerent image of the country — an image it had attempted to shape for several decades through propaganda and psychological warfare.”

Elsewhere in the statement, the ministry said, “The United States makes every effort to strip Iran of its upper hand — that is, ‘supporting legal negotiations that led to [conclusion of] the JCPOA’ — and portray an ‘anti-negotiation’ picture of Iran, and finally replace the JCPOA with an illegal, imposed negotiating table.”

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was signed between Iran and six world states — namely the US, Germany, France, Britain, Russia and China — in 2015. It was also ratified in the form of a UN Security Council resolution.

However, Washington’s unilateral withdrawal in May 2018 and subsequent re-imposition of anti-Iran sanctions left the future of the nuclear deal in limbo.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry went on to say that Iran’s insistence that if the US is inclined to negotiation, it should return to the JCPOA Joint Commission meetings and end all its sanctions and illegal measures against Iran indicates the Islamic Republic’s upper hand in the diplomatic arena.

For an entire year since Washington’s withdrawal, Tehran remained fully compliant with the JCPOA, waiting for the co-signatories to fulfill their end of the bargain by offsetting the impacts of Washington’s bans on the Iranian economy.

As the E3 states failed to do so, Tehran moved in May 2019 to suspend its JCPOA commitments under Articles 26 and 36 of the deal covering Tehran’s legal rights. Iran took its fifth and final commitment reduction step earlier this month.

Tehran has repeatedly said it is ready to resume fulfilling its commitments under the landmark nuclear deal if sanctions imposed on the country are removed and it can avail itself of the JCPOA's promised benefits.

On January 3, the United States assassinated Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), among others, in an air raid on an airport in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.

General Soleimani has earned reputation as West Asia’s most revered anti-terror commander due to his indispensable contribution to defeating terrorist outfits such as Daesh across the region.

The strike also led to the martyrdom of second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis along with eight other Iranians and Iraqis.

In retaliation, the IRGC fired volleys of ballistic missiles on January 8 at Ain al-Assad air base in the Western Iraqi province of Anbar, which housed US forces.

Elsewhere in his tweet, Araqchi described the US maximum pressure policy as a clear "big failure" and added that the White House hawks who understand nothing about Iran are still persisting.

He then pointed to a new US threat to assassinate the successor of General Soleimani and said, "Now juniors in DoS-too blind to see mass demonstrations-threaten another General!"

US special representative for Iran Brian Hook has threatened the Islamic Republic with yet another act of state terrorism, saying Washington will assassinate the successor of the late IRGC commander as well if he follows in the path of the martyred general.

“If (Esmayeel) Qaani follows the same path of killing Americans then he will meet the same fate,” Hook said.

Iran's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Abbas Mousavi said on Thursday that the US threat to assassinate the new commander of the IRGC’s Quds Force is in fact an official publicizing of state terrorism.

"The remarks by this State Department official are an official publicizing and blatant unveiling of targeted and state terrorism by the United States," the Iranian spokesperson added.

According to Fars News Agency, in relevant remarks on Wednesday, Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani condemned the assassination of Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani by the US, and said Washington is at the peak of its hostile approach towards the Islamic Republic compared with what it has done against Iran all throughout the last 40 years.

The US animosity towards Iran has reached its highest level since the Islamic Revolution, Larijani said in a local ceremony, noting that “We are now seeing a full-scale confrontation” where Washington carries out an act of “state terrorism”.

 “The martyrdom of General Soleimani led to an awakening in Iran and the region,” he stated, adding that the incident “created unity inside the country which in part affects other countries.”

 “A superpower assassinates our General who was a guest in another country … this tarnished the US image,” Larijani added.

“Westerners and Americans are using all means and plots to impede Iran’s economic growth and consequently to put pressure on people,” he said.

847/940