US ‘totally stupid’ to attack Iran during talks, Iranian UN ambassador says

The United States made a “totally stupid decision” to attack Iran while in negotiations, and betrayed Gulf nations by trashing their diplomatic efforts, Tehran’s UN ambassador says.

Ali Bahreini, Iran’s ambassador in Geneva, insists Tehran had no problem with its neighbors, but could not let US bases in the Gulf be used as launchpads for attacks on Iran. Iran has launched strikes across the Gulf.

“War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran,” Bahreini tells UN correspondents. “Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression.”

“We will continue our defense until the point that this aggression is stopped,” he said.

Bahreini says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had convinced US President Donald Trump to destroy diplomacy and attack Iran, with strikes starting on Saturday.

“It was a totally stupid decision. They will know in the future how stupid this decision has been. Both of them will understand, because Iran will firmly determine the situation and the destiny of this war,” he says. “All our neighbors are now disappointed with the betrayal of the United States because everybody was working for diplomacy, particularly Oman. The US betrayed everybody.”

Regarding Iran’s strikes in the Gulf, he says, “I cannot accept labelling what we are doing as reprisal. What we are doing is a kind of self-defense.”

He says Iran’s operations were “exclusively” against US military targets, and says “there has been a very serious order given to our military forces not to make any harm to civilians.”