RAN says the United States’ presidential election that toppled Donald Trump bears a message for all those Middle East countries which take the risk of clinching enormous arms deals with his administration in the hope of buying security.
The election carries a ‘great message’ for the region, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said in a press briefing on Monday.
He cited Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif as warning regional countries against ‘taking the gamble to buy security from psychopaths, who only think of money and arms.’
Khatibzadeh then reminded how Zarif had also warned that taking such a risk was like ‘placing one’s eggs in an unsafe basket.’
In 2017, Trump signed a whopping $110-billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia during his maiden foreign visit.
Two years later, the US State Department approved weapons sales to Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, Riyadh’s dedicated regional allies, worth almost $6 billion.
Observers say Trump’s loss in the polls has likely given rise to some questions about the future of these agreements and the quality of the regional countries’ US ties under his successor Joe Biden.
Trump also dedicated a good part of his tenure sympathising strongly with Riyadh and its allies’ hostility towards Iran, and condoning their atrocities, at the same time mounting huge pressure on the Islamic Republic.
Despite the blossoming military ties and anti-Iran alliances, the Islamic Republic has consistently urged the regional countries to find security solutions within the region itself.
Tehran has invariably held that security is not a commodity to be ‘bought’ from extra-regional sources, and calling on its neighbours to avoid friction among each other and refuse to trust foreign interference in the region.
Iran’s foreign minister has once again called on the regional countries to settle their differences through dialogue, especially now that the hawkish US president is leaving office.
Notwithstanding the turnaround in the US ruling structure – ‘some neighbouring countries are still thinking about buying security and loyalty and are focusing on lobbying operations in other countries,’ Khatibzazdeh said.
The spokesman noted how the Islamic Republic has constantly been extending its neighbours friendly gestures in order to prompt those countries that have isolated themselves from others to seek their way back to a regional alliance and ‘pursue their calm in regional arrangements’.
The official separately addressed allegations by an Israeli minister that Biden’s attitude towards Iran could result in a war between the Islamic Republic and Israel.
Tzachi Hanegbi, the occupying regime’s (Israel) minister for management of its illegal settlements, suggested earlier that the new American president’s potential return to the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and others which the Trump administration quit ‘will lead to a confrontation between Israel and Iran’.
‘Israeli officials are very much warlike, but want to do this (wage wars) at the expense of American troops’ blood,’ Khatibzadeh said.
If the occupying regime (Israel) had the ability to engage in warfare again, it would do so near Lebanon and Syria, he added.
The spokesman called it natural for the occupying entity to be seeking to foment crisis, noting how Tel Aviv had been acting so ever since it falsified its existence in 1948.
‘All of Israel’s existence and reputation consists of creating crisis,’ he said, and called Iranophobia ‘another column’ underpinning Israeli politics.
While advising all not to take such remarks seriously, the official cautioned that Iran ‘does not joke’ with anyone when it comes to the issue of its security, and noted how the country’s aggressors have received their timely responses whenever necessary and been forced to ‘seek sanctuary inside their lairs’.
Earlier, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said that the US policy of exerting ‘maximum pressure’ on the Islamic Republic in order to force it into submission has failed along with all ‘charlatans behind it’ while the Iranian nation still stands tall.
Saeed Khatibzadeh made the remarks in a Sunday tweet in response to an offensive tweet by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in which he had insulted the Iranian nation by describing elections in Iran as ‘a joke’ and claiming that Iranian people are starving as a result of the pressures caused by US sanctions.
Pompeo’s tweet came after the office of the Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, posted a tweet in which it described the chaotic situation in the United States following the recent presidential vote as a ‘spectacle’.
‘This is an example of the ugly face of liberal democracy in the US,’ the Leader’s office’s tweet said.
‘The situation in the US & what they themselves say about their elections is a spectacle! This is an example of the ugly face of liberal democracy in the US. Regardless of the outcome, one thing is absolutely clear, the definite political, civil, & moral decline of the US regime.’
Reacting to Pompeo’s insulting tweet, Khatibzadeh said the United States’ so-called maximum pressure policy against Iran has failed along with ‘the outlaw charlatans behind it’.
He added that the reason behind Pompeo’s anger was understandable, because he ‘is furious about having to leave Foggy Bottom after 2.5 yrs of one embarrassing failure after the other.’
On Saturday, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden was declared the winner of the highly controversial US election after he surpassed the 270 electoral votes he needed to oust President Trump.
Trump has refused to concede defeat after his Democrat rival Biden was declared the winner of the highly controversial US election, insisting that he will carry on with his legal challenges, as the president-elect called for unity and healing in his victory speech.
Trump, a hawkish critic of the landmark 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), unilaterally withdrew Washington from the agreement in May 2018, and unleashed the ‘toughest ever’ sanctions against the Islamic Republic in defiance of global criticism.
The US unleashed the so-called maximum pressure campaign and targeted the Iranian nation with draconian restrictive measures in order to bring it to its knees, but Iran’s economy keeps humming and is getting back on its feet.
Following its much-criticised exit from the JCPOA, Washington has been attempting to prevent the remaining signatories – the UK, France, China and Russia plus Germany – from abiding by their commitments and thus kill the historic agreement, which is widely viewed as a fruit of international diplomacy.
In an exclusive interview with Iran’s Alalam news network on Sunday, the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the new US administration must make up for its past measures and stop its economic war against the Islamic Republic and ‘return to the path of law’.
‘As the Leader (of the Islamic Revolution) said, the United States must repent. This means that it must firstly, admit to its mistakes and secondly, stop the economic war against Iran.
‘Thirdly, it must mend its ways and commit to its obligations and, as the fourth step, compensate (Iran) for losses (it has inflicted on the country),’ Khatibzadeh added.
