——— Says govt did not transfer weapons to Russia
——— Also denies sending missiles to Houthis
——— Vows to maintain missile programme for national security
——— Adds “If we don’t have missiles, Israel will bomb us, just like in Gaza”
DM Monitoring
TEHRAN: Iran could hold direct talks with the United States if Washington demonstrates “in practice” that it is not hostile to the Islamic Republic, President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Monday.
Pezeshkian was responding to a question at a news conference in Tehran on whether Tehran would be open to direct talks with the US to revive a 2015 nuclear deal.
Former US president Donald Trump reneged on that deal in 2018, arguing it was too generous to Teh-ran, and restored harsh US sanctions on Iran, prompting Tehran to gradually violate the agreement’s nuclear limits.
“We are not hostile towards the US, they should end their hostility towards us by showing their good-will in practice,” said Pezeshkian, adding: “We are brothers with the Americans as well.”
After taking office in January 2021, US President Joe Biden tried to negotiate a revival of the nuclear pact under which Iran had restricted its nuclear programme in return for relief from US, European Un-ion and UN sanctions.
However, Tehran refused to directly negotiate with Washington and worked mainly through European or Arab intermediaries. Moreover, President Pezeshkian said that his government had not transferred any weapons to Russia since it took office in August, after Western powers accused Tehran of delivering ballistic missiles to Moscow in September.
The United States and its allies accused Iran last week of transferring ballistic missiles to Russia for its war in Ukraine, imposing fresh sanctions on Moscow and Tehran. Russia and Iran both denied the Western claims.
Asked whether Iran had transferred missiles to Russia, Pezeshkian told a televised news conference: “It is possible that a delivery took place in the past… but I can assure you that since I took office, there has not been any such delivery to Russia.”
Furthermore, he said Tehran has not sent hypersonic missiles to Yemen’s Houthis, a day after the Iran-backed group said a missile it fired at Israel was a hypersonic one.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would inflict a “heavy price” on the Houthis who con-trol northern Yemen, after they reached central Israel with a missile on Sunday for the first time.
“It takes a person a week to travel to Yemen (from Iran), how could this missile have gotten there? We don’t have such missiles to provide to Yemen,” Pezeshkian said.
However, last year Iran presented what it described as Tehran’s first domestically made hypersonic ballistic missile, with state media publishing pictures of the missile named “Fattah” at a ceremony.
