US presence in Persian Gulf unwarranted: Iran official
A senior Iranian official says the presence of American military forces in the Persian Gulf lacks any legal and international justification.
“The presence of American forces in the Persian Gulf lacks any legal and international justification and is against the will of the regional nations,” Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani said on Wednesday.
He rejected claims about what Washington described as Iran’s “provocations” in the Persian Gulf, dismissing the US allegations as part of the White House's “media hue and cry.”
The US claims about Iranian vessels getting too close to American warships in the Strait of Hormuz and Iran’s threats against US aircraft approaching the Iranian airspace are mere propaganda, Shamkhani noted.
On September 6, the Pentagon spokesman, Captain Jeff Davis, said that an American patrol ship had changed its course after a speedboat from Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) came within 91 meters of the vessel near the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf.
Davis claimed the Iranian vessel had sailed directly in front of the USS Firebolt, forcing the ship to change course. He said the incident began when seven Iranian ships "harassed" the Firebolt.
Meanwhile, a US military official claimed that Iran had threatened to shoot down two US Navy aircraft over the weekend as they were flying over the Strait of Hormuz "near the Iranian airspace.”
Rear Admiral Ali Fadavi, the commander of the IRGC Navy, dismissed the US claims as untrue.
“Reports by American officials about the failure of the IRGC naval forces’ vessels to keep their distance and their confrontation with… [American] vessels are sheer lies,” the commander said on Tuesday.
On September 11, Deputy Chief of Staff of Iran's Armed Forces Brigadier General Massoud Jazayeri also rejected the claims that any US ship had been harassed by Iranian forces.
“Vessels belonging to the Islamic Republic of Iran are fully aware of international laws and regulations and have always acted based on stipulated standards, so the [US] claims are not only fictitious, but stem from their fear of the might of the Islamic Republic of Iran's forces,” Jazayeri said.
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