Iran’s Defense Capabilities Empowering Negotiators

 (FNA)- Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Brigadier General Davoud Ameri underlined that Islamic Republic's powerful defense capabilities have enabled the country's negotiators to sit at the negotiating table with the opposite sides very powerfully.

“The defense capabilities of the Islamic Republic of Iran are well known to everyone and we sit behind the negotiating table with power,” General Ameri told reporters on Tuesday.

He underlined that Iran is at such a high level of defense preparedness that no foreign power can even think about attacking the country, and said, “The same defense power has caused our power in the talks with the world powers.”

His remarks came in reaction to the recent statements of the US Secretary of State John Kerry, who said in an interview in Geneva on Thursday that the military option was still on the table “if Iran did not live up to its nuclear commitments under the Geneva deal”.

On Friday, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces for Cultural Affairs and Defense Publicity Brigadier General Massoud Jazzayeri downplayed the US and its allies' war rhetoric against Iran, and said they don't dare to attack Iran because they have no hope of victory in such a war.

In response to Kerry's comments, the senior Iranian commander said that the US government knows that the military option against Iran is not practical.

The United States has long stressed that military action is a main option for the White House to deter Iran's progress in the field of nuclear technology.

Iran has warned that in case of an attack by either the US or Israel, it will target 32 American bases in the Middle-East and close the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

An estimated 40 percent of the world's oil supply passes through the waterway.

On November 24, Iran and the Group 5+1 (the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany) sealed a six-month Joint Plan of Action to lay the groundwork for the full resolution of the West’s decade-old dispute with Iran over its nuclear energy program. In exchange for Tehran’s confidence-building bid to limit certain aspects of its nuclear activities, the Group 5+1 agreed to lift some of the existing sanctions against Tehran and continue talks with the country to settle all problems between the two sides.

The US Treasury Department in mid December added names of 19 persons and Iranian and foreign companies to the sanction list.

This is while in exchange for Iran’s confidence-building measures, the US agreed to refrain from slapping new sanctions on Iran.

At the time, the Iranian negotiators in Vienna halted nuclear talks with major world powers to return to Tehran for consultations after Washington blacklisted a dozen companies and individuals for evading US sanctions.

The experts meetings continued after US Secretary of State, John Kerry, contacted his Iranian counterpart and tried to appease Tehran.