Revolutionary Guards slam UN endorsement of nuclear deal

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have criticised a UN Security Council resolution endorsing last week’s nuclear deal, saying it crossed “red lines” set by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The Security Council adopted a resolution unanimously on Monday endorsing the deal, which relieves Iran of sanctions gradually but keeps in place an arms embargo and a ban on ballistic missile technology for several more years.

The deal faces opposition in the Republican-led US Congress as well as some Middle East countries, including Israel and Saudi Arabia, who ironically find themselves in agreement with Iranian hardliners, especially the Revolutionary Guards. The corps commander, Major General Mohammed Ali Jafari, was quoted shortly before the resolution was passed in New York as saying, “Some parts of the draft resolution have clearly crossed the Islamic republic’s red lines, especially in Iran’s military capabilities.” According to the semi-official Tasnim news agency, the general said that the Revolutionary Guards “will never accept it.”

Hossein Shariatmadari, the Editor-in-chief of Kayhan, a newspaper closely associated with Khamenei, wrote that accepting the new resolution would be tantamount to accepting previous Security Council resolutions, which Iran considers illegal. “Even by simply looking at the deal you can see some vital red lines of the Islamic Republic have not been preserved,” he pointed out.

Meanwhile, a member of Iran’s parliamentary National Security and Foreign Policy Committee claimed that the nuclear negotiations had veered too far into the military sphere. “The negotiating team was not supposed to negotiate on Iran’s ballistic missile technology,” Ahmad Bakhshayesh told Fars news agency.

The deal has yet to be endorsed by Iran’s National Security Council and Ayatollah Khamenei himself.