Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has issued a response to United States President Donald Trump’s unconditional surrender demands.
As the regional conflict enters its second week, Iran’s President slammed Trump’s surrender demands, characterizing the U.S call as a “dream they should take to their grave.”
Iran’s enemies “must take their wish for the unconditional surrender of the Iranian people to their graves,” Pezeshkian said, in a speech broadcast on state TV.
The statement comes in direct response to a social media post by President Donald Trump on Friday, in which he insisted there would be “no deal” with Tehran without a total capitulation.
Trump’s ultimatum included the suggestion that the U.S would oversee the selection of “great and acceptable” new leaders for the Islamic Republic, a move Tehran viewed as a direct threat to its national sovereignty.
Israel and the United States launched strikes against Iran on February 28, killing the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and triggering a regional conflict.
Iran has since responded with missile and drone strikes on Israel and US interests in regional countries, mainly in the Gulf.
Pezeshkian is among three members of an interim leadership council that has been in charge of Iran since Khamenei’s killing.
In remarks carried by Iranian media, the president also apologised to neighbouring countries for the strikes that took place in recent days.
During the speech, Pezeshkian apologised to neighbouring countries for Iran’s attacks across the region, saying that they would not be targeted unless attacks originated from them.
“I must apologise on my own behalf and on behalf of Iran to the neighbouring countries that were attacked by Iran,” he said.
“The interim leadership council agreed yesterday that no more attacks will be made on neighbouring countries and no missiles will be fired unless an attack on Iran originates from those countries.”
Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman, all the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations, have been targeted due to the presence of U.S assets within and around their borders. Iraq, Jordan, Azerbaijan, and Turkiye have also been caught in the crosshairs.
In the Gulf, there have been deaths, damage, and major disruption to flights, closure of airspace, and a heavy knock-on impact on oil and gas production reverberating across the world.
However, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) also weighed in.
“Following the statements of the president, the armed forces once again declare that they respect the interests and national sovereignty of neighbouring countries and, up to this point, have committed no aggression against them,” the statement, which was carried by state media, said.
“However, should the previous hostile actions continue, all military bases and interests of criminal America and the fake Zionist regime on land, at sea, and in the air across the region will be considered primary targets and will come under the powerful and crushing strikes of the mighty armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
