News / Interviews

'US, Iran tensions can turn Mideast into powder keg'

Wednesday, 22 May 2019 10:13 AM [ Last Update: Wednesday, 22 May 2019 10:40 AM ]

This handout picture released by the US Navy on May 19, 2019 shows the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) pulling alongside the fast combat support ship USNS Arctic (T-AOE 8) during a replenishment-at-sea. (Photo by AFP)

The United States is waking up to the fact that Iran is a regional superpower that cannot be bullied, says an activist, warning that Washington’s warmongering policies against the Islamic Republic could turn the Middle East into a powder keg.

“The [US President Donald] Trump administration is under growing pressure both at home and abroad. It is diplomatically isolated and there is a growing outcry by its allies in Europe and elsewhere with respect to its warmongering policies against Iran. So the administration is now dialing back on its military pressure and threats against Iran and I think that it is waking up to the reality in the region that Iran is in many respects a regional superpower," Kaveh Afrasiabi told Press TV in an interview on Wednesday.

The US is starting to realize that Iran is not a trivial state which can be bullied and which they can "wage an economic warfare against and try to strangle the Iranian economy and cause incalculable suffering on the part of the Iranian people with the Iranian government simply sitting on its hand and passively observing this very illegal US aggression,” he continued.

“The US has to recognize that … they cannot wage unilateral economic warfare against Iran without expecting some sort of a response from Iran and the Iranian nation. So the US has to reconsider its unwise policy because … it will turn the Persian Gulf region into a powder keg and it will be a pan-regional war," Afrasiabi commented.

He added that rather than being a limited war between the US and Iran, any such confrontation would involve all other countries in the region; not to mention that it will have devastating consequences for the global economy, including that of the US.

Tensions started to mount between Tehran and Washington in May last year, when Trump pulled his country out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and re-imposed harsh sanctions against the Islamic Republic in defiance of global criticisms.

The tensions saw a sharp rise on the first anniversary of Washington's exit from the deal as the US moved to ratchet up the pressure on Iran by tightening its oil sanctions and sending military reinforcements, including an aircraft carrier strike group, a squadron of B-52 bombers, and a battery of patriot missiles, to the Middle East.