THE Islamic Republic’s first and foremost priority is a ‘decisive and firm’ battle to defend its territory against the ongoing unprovoked US-Israeli war of aggression, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi said yesterday.
‘They must pay for their actions. The atonement is in fact the decisive operations that we are carrying out in self-defence. It is the Islamic Republic of Iran that determines when the war ends,’ he said.
‘China, Russia, France and even some regional states are in contact with us, alongside Muslim and non-Muslim countries. Some of these states actually intend to take concrete action, halt the war and help conclude a ceasefire,’ he said.
Gharibabadi emphasised that it is pointless if a ceasefire comes into effect that would stop the aggression for now, but then the Islamic Republic comes under attack six months later.
The Iranian Parliament speaker Mohamad Baqer Qalibaf wrote on X yesterday: ‘We are certainly not looking for a ceasefire, and we believe a sharp blow must be delivered to the aggressors, so they would draw a lesson and would never think of launching aggression against Iran again.’
He added that the Israeli regime reveals its ‘shameful’ existence in the continuation of ‘war-negotiations-ceasefire-and-once-again-war’ cycle to assert its dominance, stressing that Iran will break off such a cycle.
He stated that the United States ‘seeks to seize Iran’s oil reserves in an attempt to dominate global energy supplies’ as the unprovoked aggression against the Islamic Republic by the US-Israeli military coalition entered its eleventh day.