Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said his country wants “justice” for the United States’s killing of Quds Force leader Gen. Qasem Soleimani, though he denied that this “would include the assassination of U.S. officials,” a questionable comment considering an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps member has already been accused of such plans.
“What the then-American government did by the direct order of [President Donald] Trump himself to assassinate Mr. Qasem Soleimani — this was a heinous crime,” he said in an interview with 60 Minutes that aired on Sunday. “We want justice to be served. We are not going to forget about this.”
He was asked if seeking “justice” meant the assassination of U.S. officials, and the Iranian leader responded, “That’s the type of the actions the American and Zionist regimes are doing in the world. We are not going to carry out the same actions.”
STATE DEPARTMENT SAYS NUCLEAR DEAL TALKS WITH IRAN ARE ‘AT A STALEMATE’
Despite Raisi’s comments, the Justice Department unsealed charges in August accusing Shahram Poursafi of attempting to murder former Trump national security adviser John Bolton. Prosecutors said Poursafi “remains at large abroad” but that, if convicted, he faces up to 10 years in prison.
Soleimani, who was assassinated in Iraq in January 2020, was the head of the IRGC and its specialized Quds Force, which the U.S. considers responsible for the deaths of over 600 U.S. soldiers during the Iraq War. The Pentagon said in early 2020, “General Soleimani and his Quds Force were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition service members and the wounding of thousands more.”
Raisi’s interview occurred as the U.S. and Iran are working toward reentering the 2015 nuclear agreement that President Trump withdrew from in 2018. While the two sides have reached a “stalemate,” according to a senior State Department official, Raisi said Iran would need assurances within the deal to ensure the U.S. wouldn’t pull out of it again.
“If it’s a good deal and fair deal, we would be serious about reaching an agreement. It needs to be lasting,” he explained. “We cannot trust the Americans because of the behavior that we’ve already seen from them. That is why if there is no guarantee, there is no trust.”
The two sides had made progress on a deal, National Security Council Coordinator John Kirby acknowledged last month, adding that Iran had abandoned several sticking points, though Iran’s response to a final proposal from the European Union, which is coordinating talks to reconstitute the deal, was far from promising.
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Last week, State Department Deputy Secretary Wendy Sherman said, “Well, we’re at a stalemate in the sense that Iran, in the latest round of negotiations, has given us a pretty tough response, one that’s unacceptable to us. We’ve sent back a message about what we believe is necessary and what are critical elements here.” Days earlier, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that a deal in the near future is “unlikely.”
Raisi said he didn’t see a purpose in meeting with President Joe Biden this week as both attend the U.N. General Assembly.
