Iran entitled to protect its sovereignty: Analyst

Press TV has interviewed Scott Rickard, a former American intelligence linguist in Orlando, to discuss the remarks made by Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani, saying the country’s ballistic missile serves defensive and deterrent purposes, stressing that the Islamic Republic has never sought to launch aggression against any country.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: So Iran’s President has made his views clear about the disappointment of what he referred to as warmongers and those who are disappointed. Who do you think he was referring to?

Rickard: He’s absolutely referring to the NATO allies and specifically the UN Security Council individuals that are putting this forward attempting to basically misname. It is a very clear distinction that these are ballistic missile tests; these are not nuclear missile tests. These ballistic missiles have been around with Iran since the 70s, they are improving on their technology, that is all, and they are testing their technology and certainly the West tests their technology all the time. These missiles are a deterrent to the West, just incessant attacks along every single border of Iran and Iran rightfully should be creating some sort of deterrent to protect its sovereignty from the aggressive nature, from the US and its NATO and its [Persian] Gulf state allies.

Press TV: Why is it that one fact always remains to be overlooked and that is the fact that the IAEA itself is part of the UN and they are part of the JCPOA which obviously they are doing their rigorous monitoring of Iran’s activities and of course Iran has been passing with flying colors but that does not get mentioned?

Rickard: Well what is interesting is that they are trying to interpret the actual agreement as well as basically disrupting the nature of the true agreement with Iran. The true agreement with Iran was that Iran would call, they would call for refraining intercontinental or basically ballistic missile testing. However, it did not prohibit it and so what is happening here is it is an interpretation when in fact Russia and China are absolutely in the correct state here by saying that this is not a violation, that Iran has every opportunity to test ballistic missiles as they are testing them and making sure that they are not equipped with and they are not being used for any type of nuclear type of missile.

So there is a clear distinction here and I think what happens is having individuals like Samantha Power who are absolutely on the side of what they are calling warmongers …, President Rouhani calls warmongers, but these are individuals who have an agenda in the region. Cass Sunstein is Samantha Power’s husband. These individuals are absolutely closely tied to the pro-Israel Zionist lobby influencers who are taking control of the American politics again.

You see Donald Trump, absolutely he is a Zionist puppet, Ted Cruz [is] absolute Zionist puppet and also you have obviously Hillary Clinton who is a Zionist puppet and those are the three obvious choices that the Zionist groups have been backing and it is very scary to know that in any one of those three, if I were Iran I would be very suspicious and very cautious knowing that those individuals will be coming into office potentially in just under a year.

So it is a very sad situation for the United States’ political movements and I see it as a true, just violation of treaties and agreements by continually bashing Iran for something that is absolutely in accord with the agreement.

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