Russia slams US threat of assassinating new Quds Force commander

Russia has strongly condemned the US for threatening to assassinate Brigadier General Esmaeil Ghaani, the new commander of the Quds Force of Iran's Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC).

Iran PressEurope: "I state once again that such statements are unacceptable for us. Such remarks have been made beyond rights and law, and representatives of world states are not entitled to utter them," the Arabic service of Russia’s Sputnik news agency quoted Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova as saying at a news briefing in Moscow on Thursday 23 January.

Earlier in the day, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyyed Abbas Mousavi denounced Washington’s assassination threat against Brig. Gen. Esmail Ghaani stating that the latest remarks by US Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook 'are an official publicizing and open flaunting of state-sponsored terrorism by the United States'.

Hook told the Arabic-language and Saudi-owned daily Asharq al-Awsat that the new Quds Force commander could face the fate of his predecessor, Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani, who was assassinated along with the Second-in-Command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, and their companions near Baghdad International Airport on January 3.

In a message addressed to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei on January 9, Brig. Gen. Esmail Ghaani vowed to continue the path pursued by Lt. Gen. Soleimani 'with might'. He said the goal was to drive American terrorist forces out of the region.

On January 8, the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) in retaliation for US terrorist act of assassinating Lieutenant General Soleimani fired a number of ballistic missiles at Ein al-Assad airbase in Iraq’s Western Province of al-Anbar, where more than 1,000 US terrorist troops are based, and another American military facility in Kurdistan’s regional capital Erbil.  207/211/219

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