Middle East tensions: Iran vows to answer ‘aggression’, says Mohammad Javad Zarif
Tehran says it will defend itself against any further aggression, although it is not seeking escalation or war.
Tehran would defend itself against any further aggression, although it was not seeking escalation or war, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has tweeted after Tehran hit US targets in Iraq.
“Iran took & concluded proportionate measures in self-defence under Article 51 of UN Charter targeting base from which cowardly armed attack against our citizens & senior officials were launched,” Mr Zarif tweeted after Tehran hit US targets in Iraq.
“We do not seek escalation or war, but will defend ourselves against any aggression.’’
Iran said it had launched a missile attack on US-led forces in Iraq in the early hours of Wednesday in retaliation for the US drone strike on an Iranian commander whose killing has raised fears of a wider war in the Middle East.
Tehran fired more than a dozen ballistic missiles from Iranian territory against at least two Iraqi military bases hosting US-led coalition personnel at 1.30am (9am AEDT), the US military said.
Iraq confirmed that 22 missiles had been fired, with the large al-Asad base in the west of the country struck, along with a base at Irbil in the north.
It is not yet clear how many missiles found their targets.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps confirmed it fired the missiles to retaliate for last week’s killing of general Qassem Soleimani, according to a statement on state TV.
The statement advised the US to withdraw its troops from the region to prevent more deaths.
A US official said there were very few, if any, casualties.
“We are working on initial battle damage assessments,” Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and US Defence Secretary Mark Esper arrived at the White House following news of the attack.
Hours earlier, Mr Esper said the US should anticipate retaliation from Iran over Friday’s killing in Iraq of Soleimani, commander of the Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force.
“I think we should expect that they will retaliate in some way, shape or form,” he said at the Pentagon, adding that such retaliation could be through Iran-backed proxy groups outside of Iran or “by their own hand”.
“We’re prepared for any contingency. And then we will respond appropriately to whatever they do.”
GRAPHIC: The US and Iran square off
Asian stockmarkets fell sharply on news of the rocket attack, while investor safe havens including the Japanese yen and gold shot higher. US crude prices surged almost 5 per cent on worries that any conflict could cut oil supplies.
Prices later eased, up 1.3 per cent for the day, after traders took reassurance from US President Donald Trump’s Twitter declaration that “all is well”.
Soleimani, a pivotal figure in orchestrating Iran’s longstanding campaign to drive US forces out of Iraq, was also responsible for building up Tehran’s network of proxy armies across the Middle East.
He was a national hero to many Iranians but viewed as a dangerous villain by Western governments opposed to Iran’s arc of influence running across the Middle East. “We will take revenge, a hard and definitive revenge,” the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, General Hossein Salami, told throngs who crowded the streets for Soleimani’s funeral on Tuesday in Kerman, his home town in southeastern Iran.
In rolling media appearances before Iran’s attack, US President Donald Trump, Mr Esper, Mr Pompeo, and National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said Soleimani was a lifelong supporter of terrorist movements who posed a direct threat to US troops and interests.
“His time was due,” Mr Esper said. All four also said the airstrike that killed Soleimani was a matter of US self-defence.
Soleimani had been planning a “very big attack and a very bad attack for us and other people and we stopped it, and I don’t think anybody can complain about it,” Mr Trump said.
Mr Esper told CNN that Soleimani’s death prevented an attack that was likely in “a matter of days, certainly no more than weeks”.
Reuters, The Wall Street Journal
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