File Photo: Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi. AP
In an interview with PBS News Hour that aired Monday night, Araghchi said that he did not think that the US and Israel have a realistic endgame and are now just sowing chaos.
“They thought that, in a matter of two or three days, they can go for a regime change, they can go for a rapid, clean victory, but they failed…they failed to achieve their goals at the beginning, and now, after 10 days, I think they are aimless,” Araghchi said.
When asked about the widespread disruptions the conflict has caused to oil deliveries, which in turn is causing volatility across markets worldwide, Araghchi maintained that the spike in oil prices was not Iran’s fault.
“This is not our plan,” Araghchi said. “The oil production, the transportation of oil has been slowed down or stopped, not because of us, but because of the attacks and aggression made by Israelis and Americans against us. So they have made the whole region insecure. And this is why the tankers, the ships, are scared to pass through the Strait of Hormuz.
He continued, “We have not closed that strait. We have not – we are not preventing them to navigate in that strait. But this is the result of the aggression by Israelis and Americans, which has made the whole region insecure and unstable.”
When anchor Amna Nawaz pushed Araghchi on the issue, pointing out that the Irani military had conducted airstrikes on multiple oil facilities in other nations – and that a spokesperson for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards had said: “If you can tolerate oil at more than $200 per barrel, continue this game” – Araghchi maintained that “what we are doing is only defending ourselves”.
“We are facing an act of aggression, which is absolutely illegal. And what we are doing is the act of self-defence, which is legal and legitimate. Well, we have already warned everybody in the region that, if the US attacks us, since we cannot reach American soil, we have to attack their bases in the region, their facilities, their installations, their assets.
“And as a result, the war would be spread into the whole region. So this is the consequence, the consequence of the US aggression against us. We are not responsible for that.”
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