Supreme Leader of Iran and its Spiritual Leader Ayatollah Ali Hamenei threatened on Thursday that the Islamic Republic will respond by an /iron fist/ if the USA and Israel start an aggression. Russia and China were against tougher sanctions against Iran and call for resuming the negotiations. Moscow considers the new sanctions to be an instrument for changing the regime in Tehran.
Iranians deny energetically all accusations presented to them and call the latest report from IAEA faked up at the political order from the USA, the Nezavisimaya Gazeta writes. Meanwhile, Russia found itself under fire of criticism. Western media call straightforwardly the Russian Federation /Iran’s ally/ and write that it “crossed the road to the new sanctions.”
Moscow really believes the calls for applying new sanctions are counterproductive and says that the nuclear issue may not be used as a reason for changing the regime in Tehran, the newspaper writes. The Russian Federation has expressed itself categorically against a military solution having warned it would have serious negative consequences for security in the world.
Russia’s diplomacy has met the IAEA’s report without enthusiasm: neither does it contain principally new data or well-known facts “receive deliberate political shading,” the Moskovsky Komsomolets writes. In fact, everything comes to the fact that Moscow is against new anti-Iranian sanctions and believes them an instrument to change the regime in Tehran. This position should not be considered as support for the Islamic republic. It is rather shifting aside. But what is behind it – short-sightedness or pragmatism? – the newspaper asks.
Evgeny Satanovsky of the Institute of the Middle East told in an interview with the newspaper that Russia is doing correctly by opposing additional sanctions against Iran following the report from IAEA. “It is a cynical interest of the country, which does not or should not have anything but interests. We have a common border along the Caspian Sea. Should it wish, Iran may, say, in Dagestan or generally in the North Caucasus, within three or four months organise a situation, like with /Hezbollah/ in South Lebanon. We cannot afford behaving towards Iran the way the USA, France or the UK do.”
Russia’s military are analysing already possible consequences from attacks against Iran, the Rossiiskaya Gazeta writes. First of all, generals want to know the level of threat should Iranian nuclear objects be damaged. Evgeny Starkov, head of radiation, chemical and biological protection of Russia’s Armed Forces, rocket attacks will damage not only peace population, but the ecology of the big region. He did not even try to estimate beforehand how bad the ecology catastrophe may be – it will depend on how much intensive the attacks will be.