Skip to main content

Iran: Trump's Reaction To Deadly Attacks Is 'Repugnant'

Foreign minister Javad Zarif rejects statement by US president that Iran fell victim 'to the evil they promote'.

By Al Jazeera

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has called US President Donald Trump's reaction to deadly attacks in Tehran "repugnant", as intelligence officials said that the five attackers were Iranians who had fought for ISIL in Syria and Iraq.
At least 16 people were killed on Wednesday in attacks claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group, as suicide bombers and gunmen targeted the Iranian parliament and the mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini - leader of the 1979 revolution - in the capital, Tehran.
"Repugnant [White House] statement & Senate sanctions as Iranians counter terror backed by US clients. Iranian people reject such US claims of friendship," Zarif tweeted on Thursday.
He was responding to a statement released by Trump's press secretary's office, which took the opportunity of an attack to make a point that "states that sponsor terrorism risk falling victim to the evil they promote".
 
The White House statement, which mentioned how Iranian people were "going through such challenging times", came as the US Senate advanced legislation that would impose new sanctions on the Islamic Republic, partly for what the bill described as Iran's "support for acts of international terrorism".
What kind of "terrorism" these statements refer to remains vague. Trump has long accused Iran of backing "terrorism" and has threatened to tear up a 2015 nuclear deal between the Iranian government and major western powers.
Trump's comments also brought criticism from Iranians on social media, who recalled their government's offers of support and candlelit vigils held in Iran after the attacks of September 11, 2001 in New York. 
"Iranians lit candles for you on 9/11. You kick them while they're down. Classy," tweeted Ali Ghezelbash, an Iranian business analyst.

Attackers fought for ISIL

More than 40 people were also wounded in Wednesday's attacks.
A statement by the intelligence ministry issued on Thursday said that the men who carried out the twin attacks had left Iran to fight for ISIL in the Iraqi city of Mosul, as well as Raqqa, in Syria - the armed group's de facto capital - before returning last summer.
It identified the men only by their first names, saying they did not want to release their last names owing to security and privacy concerns for their families.
The assault marks the first attacks claimed by ISIL in Iran.

Iranian security officials counter that it is their regional rival Saudi Arabia, a close US ally, that is responsible for funding and spreading the ideology that most closely resembles ISIL's.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard weighed Saudi Arabia of being behind Wednesday's attacks.
"The fact that Islamic State has claimed responsibility proves that they were involved in the brutal attack," the Revolutionary Guard said in a statement, referring to Saudi Arabia.
The statement also said that the "spilled blood of the innocent will not remain unavenged".


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why States Still Use Barrel Bombs

Smoke ascends after a Syrian military helicopter allegedly dropped a barrel bomb over the city of Daraya on Jan. 31.(FADI DIRANI/AFP/Getty Images) Summary Barrel bombs are not especially effective weapons. They are often poorly constructed; they fail to detonate more often than other devices constructed for a similar purpose; and their lack of precision means they can have a disproportionate effect on civilian populations. However, combatants continue to use barrel bombs in conflicts, including in recent and ongoing conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, and they are ideally suited to the requirements of resource-poor states. Analysis Barrel bombs are improvised devices that contain explosive filling and shrapnel packed into a container, often in a cylindrical shape such as a barrel. The devices continue to be dropped on towns all over Syria . Indeed, there have been several documented cases of their use in Iraq over the past months, and residents of the city of Mosul, which was re...
Post a Comment
Read more

Russia Looks East for New Oil Markets

Click to Enlarge In the final years of the Soviet Union, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev began orienting his foreign policy toward Asia in response to a rising Japan. Putin has also piloted a much-touted pivot to Asia, coinciding with renewed U.S. interest in the area. A good expression of intent was Russia's hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in 2012 in Vladivostok, near Russia's borders with China and North Korea. Although its efforts in Asia have been limited by more direct interests in Russia's periphery and in Europe, Moscow recently has been able to look more to the east. Part of this renewed interest involves finding new export markets for Russian hydrocarbons. Russia's economy relies on energy exports, particularly crude oil and natural gas exported via pipeline to the West. However, Western Europe is diversifying its energy sources as new supplies come online out of a desire to reduce its dependence on Russian energy supplies . This has ...
Post a Comment
Read more

LONDON POLICE INDIRECTLY ENCOURAGE CRIMINALS TO ATTACK RUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC PROPERTY

ILLUSTRATIVE IMAGE A few days ago an unknown perpetrator trespassed on the territory of the Russian Trade Delegation in London, causing damage to the property and the vehicles belonging to the trade delegation , Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said during the September 12 press briefing. The diplomat revealed the response by the London police was discouraging. Police told that the case does not have any prospects and is likely to be closed. This was made despite the fact that the British law enforcement was provided with video surveillance tapes and detailed information shedding light on the incident. By this byehavior, British law inforcements indirectly encourage criminals to continue attacks on Russian diplomatic property in the UK. Zakharova’s statement on “Trespassing on the Russian Trade Mission premises in London” ( source ): During our briefings, we have repeatedly discussed compliance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, sp...
1 comment
Read more