In an interview with Eugene Doyle, Iran’s ambassador to New Zealand, Reza Nazar Ahari, says the US and its allies have misunderstood Iran’s identity, sovereignty and resistance to outside pressure.

In this interview with His Excellency Reza Nazar Ahari, the Iranian Ambassador to Wellington, we discussed the war, the state of diplomacy with the West, issues of sovereignty, defence and the internal politics of Iran. He provided some fascinating analysis into why the Western strategy on Iran has been so disastrously flawed.

The US has stated many objectives, many reasons for launching the war. For Iran, what is at stake?

The Americans have come to take control of all things in Iran – not just the oil of Iran and the land of Iran, but to take control of Iranians’ own identity, our independence and our way of life.

President Trump said once during the war, “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again”. In spite of having suffered enormous damage and paid a heavy price, Iran has to defend itself because otherwise there will be no Iran.

Especially in the West, the way to eliminate your enemy is not only by hard power, by artillery, by guns. There are many other means: by the media, by demonising, by culturally attacking a country, by imposing sanctions. In the last decades we have been under all of these types of attacks. We are one of the best in the world in knowing how to counter all of these attacks.

What we’re seeing from Iran is you are very powerfully standing up for Iranian sovereignty in the face of an astonishing assault.

National identity is the main asset of any nation and it should be studied........

© Pearls and Irritations