TEHRAN – A top IRGC commander said on Tuesday that no country can undermine Iran’s missile power or its regional influence. The remarks by Brigadier General Hossein Salami, the second-ranking official at the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, was in response to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s anti-Iran speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation on […]
TEHRAN – A top IRGC commander said on Tuesday that no country can undermine Iran’s missile power or its regional influence.
The remarks by Brigadier General Hossein Salami, the second-ranking official at the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, was in response to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s anti-Iran speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation on May 21 in which he set 12 conditions for Iran to accept or it will face “strongest sanctions in history”.
Salami said the IRGC has reached such a high degree of military capability that the U.S. secretary of state lays out 12 conditions for a “new deal” with Iran and calls on Tehran to end its regional influence.
This means that U.S. officials are unable to end the Islamic Republic’s presence in the region and that is why they call on the country to do so, the commander added, Tasnim reported.
“They think Iran should end the development of its missile (program)” and “since they cannot force us, they ask us to do it, ourselves,” the general noted.
“No one can destroy our missile power and if they are afraid they can go to shelters,” Salami suggested.
Seyed Hossein Mousavian, a Middle East security and nuclear policy specialist at Princeton University,
Says Pompeo’s 12 demands reflect a misunderstanding of Iranian foreign policy, international law, and the realities of the region.
In a commentary Washington Post also said Pompeo’s demands ‘are completely divorced from reality’.
