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Zarif: Iran will never start a war, but will defend itself

18 July 2019 13:24 (UTC +04:00)

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the Islamic Republic “will never start a war,” but “will defend” itself against any act of aggression, APA reports citing Tasnim News Agency.

“There is a war going on right now. It’s an economic war -- an economic war against Iran targets the civilian population," Zarif told CNN in a recent interview.

He also noted that Trump is on the record saying “that he is not engaged in military war, but in an economic war,” adding that “economic war is nothing to be proud of, because, in a military confrontation, civilians may become collateral damage, but in an economic war, civilians are the primary targets.”

Asked about the possibility of a war with the US, Zarif said, “You cannot simply disregard a possibility of a disaster.”

“We’ve never started a war (and) we will never start a war, but we will defend ourselves and anybody who starts a war with Iran will not be the one who ends it,” he emphasized.

Note that tensions have been running high between Tehran and Washington since last year, when Trump unilaterally withdrew the US from the 2015 multilateral nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and unleashed the “toughest ever” sanctions against the Islamic Republic.