TEHRAN – President Hassan Rouhani late on Tuesday denounced the U.S. sanctions campaign against Iran, saying Washington is “fighting” 82 Iranians not just the Iranian government.

“The United States’ current actions against the Iranian nation are not just war and sanction, but crime against humanity,” the president told a session of the Administrative Council of West Azarbaijan Province.

“What America is doing today is not war and sanction, but crime against humanity because they are stopping our medicine and foodstuff purchases and preventing patients’ travel,” the presidential official website quoted Rouhani as saying.

The U.S. has introduced the harshest ever sanctions against Iran in line with the policy of “maximum pressure” against Tehran.

“Speeches they (U.S. officials) make against Iran are written by Zionists word by word.”

“Today, when the greatest imperialist power in the world, which is the United States, is doing its worst against us, the Islamic Republic of Iran is the symbol of religion, dignity and independence against the power that is the symbol of blasphemy,” he stated.

The Trump administration has threatened that if any country or company buys oil from Iran will face penalty. 

Rouhani said the Trump administration will regret its “unwise” approach toward Iran.

“The Americans have repeatedly failed on the same path, but they are doing it again, and they will regret this unwise action against a great, free nation”.

The Americans could choose another path, the president suggested, saying, “They could announce that foodstuff, medicine and people’s needs are exempt from sanctions.”

Analysts say that sanctions approach that Washington has adopted against Iran is intended to strangle the Iranian economy.

“America wants to stand against a nation with all its power and pressure it can use,” Rouhani remarked.

Citing a story from his visit to the annual UN General Assembly in September 2018, the president said, “In my last visit to New York, a well-known world leader told me that in his earlier meeting with the U.S. president, he had told him not to help Iran for just three months, and there would be no Islamic Republic. In that meeting, I told him to tell that man that Iran is more united and integrated than any other time,” he said. “You, people like you, and your government in the White House will come and go, but the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Iranian nation will be everlasting in history.”

With an open reference to remarks by Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton who had told a gathering of MEK (also called MKO) in Paris that the Islamic Revolution would not see its 40th anniversary, the president said, “One of their officials said that they would be in Tehran on that year’s Christmas. Somewhere else, they said that the Islamic Republic of Iran would not see the 40th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. I told them to write down the date and see where Iran will be after that time.” 

Miscalculations 

The president went on to say that hardliners in the U.S. have miscalculations about Iran.

“They have miscalculations and childish thoughts in their heads, which make problems for the Iranian nation, but will leave a bad record of them in history.”

Noting that a couple of groups have misled the U.S., Rouhani said. “One group is the extremists inside the U.S., and the second group is the Zionists, whose words we can distinguish.”

“Speeches they make against Iran are written by Zionists word by word. Extremists, Zionists and reactionaries in the region have been thinking for 40 years about the day the Islamic Republic of Iran fails, considering Iran as a great threat to their countries and governments,” he stated.

The president said reckless behavior by Trump and those extremists with influence on his administration have failed to make Iran to take radical approaches.

“Extremists, Zionists and reactionaries in the region have been thinking for 40 years about the day the Islamic Republic of Iran fails, considering Iran as a great threat to their countries and governments.” 

“They had several plans to make us angry so that we would withdraw from the JCPOA, violating the 7-party agreement, but they did not succeed,” he stressed. “They (Americans) were working on the other 6 countries, especially the Europeans, to leave the deal all together, but they could not get anyone to agree, and eventually the U.S. had no choice but to exit the deal alone.”

Rouhani went on to say that the Trump administration have been working hard to provoke the world including its allies to rescind the nuclear deal, officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPO). 

“America wanted to unite everyone in tearing off the JCPOA, but they did not succeed… It was for the first time that the United Nations and The Hague issued a verdict against the U.S. sanctions, warning them not to implement them,” the president remarked.

“Despite all hardships, the Iranian nation are standing strong against the enemies, defending our political, geographical and legal borders,” the president emphasized.

Rouhani said the Trump administration will fail to break the will of the entire Iranian population through economic war.

“The White House cannot defeat the Iranian nation; they would if they were facing a group, but they are facing the entire Iranian nation,” he concluded.

In May 2018, President Trump pulled the U.S. out from the 2015 nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, and re-imposed sanctions on Iran’s economy.

SP/PA