Iran: Ayatollah Khamenei dismisses US warning on missile tests, says Trump 'real face' of corruption

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday dismissed a United States warning on the country conducting missile tests and said the Iranian people would “show their stance against such threats”. Khamenei called United States Donald Trump the “real face” of American corruption and said the new administration had shown the world “the depth of corruption in the US government”.

“Their claims to human rights are no longer tenable,” Khamenei said. “By embarking on such actions, like putting handcuffs on a five-year-old child, he [Trump] is demonstrating the reality behind the American human rights,” the leader told a gathering of military commanders. He asked the Iranian public to rally across the country on February 10, the anniversary of the country’s revolution, to protest against Trump’s actions.

Responding to Khamenei’s remarks, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Iran needed to recognise Trump would not let Tehran



“flout its violations or apparent violations” to the nuclear deal the country signed with six world powers in 2015, Reuters reported. “I think Iran is kidding itself if they don’t realise there’s a new president in town,” Spicer said. Khamenei’s remarks after Trump’s administration on February 1 said it was “officially putting Iran on notice” because of its missile tests.

Relations between the two countries have soured since Trump, who has criticised Iran’s leadership and the nuclear deal, won the US’ presidential elections in November 2016. On November 9, 2016, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said there was “no possibility” of the nuclear deal being revoked Trump’s administration. “The United States no longer has the capacity to create Iranophobia and to create a consensus against Iran,” Rouhani had said. Tehran is also considering barring Americans from entering the country in retaliation to Trump’s immigration ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations.