Publicité
Iran says US must stop interfering if it wants ties
Par
Partager cet article
Iran says US must stop interfering if it wants ties
Iran said yesterday that a rapprochement with Washington was impossible until the United States stopped interfering in Tehran?s domestic affairs.
Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi also fired back at US accusations that Iran?s presidential poll, the first round of which was held on Friday, was a sham.
?We are willing to hold a survey in the region to see whether it is Iran or the US which is pursuing real democracy,? he told reporters in Tehran.
Although the Guardian Council, a hardline watchdog, banned more than 1,000 candidates from standing for president, some 63 percent of eligible voters turned out to vote for seven candidates, three reformists and four conservatives.
?When America continues to interfere in Iran?s state matters and supports Iranian opposition groups and so on, there is no room for a change in relations?, Kharrazi added.
Washington often criticises Iran for human rights abuses and accuses Tehran of funding anti-Israeli militias and seeking nuclear arms. Iran denies these charges.
US forces in Iraq are holding members of the People?s Mujahideen Organisation, an Iranian exiled opposition group, in detention but have granted them ?protected status? although they are listed as terrorists by Washington and the European Union.
Monarchist groups and Persian-language satellite television channels calling for regime change in Tehran are based in the United States.
The United States severed ties in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic revolution after radical students stormed the US embassy and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
Presidential candidate Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has said he would like to restore ties with Washington but has called on the United States to make the first move by unfreezing Iranian assets seized there after the revolution.
His hardline opponent in the June 24 presidential run-off, Tehran mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has said the US stance towards Iran is too hostile for a rapprochement.
Publicité
Publicité
Les plus récents
