In an interview with the Al-Jazeera television network, Shamkhani referred to comments made by America's secretary of state , Mike Pompeo, and said it is wrong to refer to Pompeo's criticisms of Iranian behaviour as
"A New Iran Strategy", because what he said was neither a strategy nor new.
Shamkhani reiterated that when US president Donald trump decided to walk away from the nuclear agreement (the JCPOA ) , he expected three things to happen , namely (1) - Trump expected Europe to follow suit and to withdraw from the JCPOA quickly (2) other countries to fall behind the US and declare their support for America's withdrawal from the JCPOA (3) the backing of the American people .
But , Shamkhani added, none of these things happened and Trump faced defeat and failure following his withdrawal from the nuclear deal.
Elsewhere in his remarks , the secretary of Iran's supreme national security council emphasized that America entered into the nuclear negotiations with Iran precisely because the Americans knew that sanctions were ineffective against Iran , and given Iran's military power , airstrikes against Iran would not have stopped Iran's (civilian) nuclear programme. So, in a sense, the Americans were forced to enter into negotiations with Iran.
Shanmkhani added: "In addition, Iran's civilian nuclear industry is completely home-grown, and we have developed this knowledge and technology ourselves, without outside help. Since you can't destroy knowledge, it follows that you can't destroy Iran's civilian nuclear energy programme !"
The secretary of Iran's supreme national security council further warned the Americans by saying: "Far from hampering or hindering the nuclear programme, Western sanctions actually led to accelerated development of Iran's civilian nuclear industry. The Americans had no option but to enter talks with Iran.
Turning to Syria, Shamkhani said the Syrian government sought help from Iran in its fight against Daesh terrorists , and we provided them with assistance. Defeat of Daesh terrorists in Syria has nothing to do with America's so-called anti-terrorist coalition. Daesh was defeated because Iran, Syria, and Russia worked together to defeat all the various terrorist groups active in Syria , including Daesh.
